WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 


By  the  same  Author 


THE  TRIUMPH  OF  THE  EGG 
POOR  WHITE 
WINESBURG,  OHIO 
MID-AMERICAN  CHANTS 
MARCHING  MEN 
WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 


WINDY 
McPHERSON'S 

SON  .lji;lB 


BY 

SHERWOOD  ANDERSON 


REVISED    EDITION 


NEW  YORK 

B.  W.  HUEBSCH,  INC, 
MCMXXII 


Copyright,  1916, 
BY  JOHN  LANE  COMPANY 

Copyright,  1922, 
BY  B.  W.  HUKBSCH,  INC. 


TO 

THE  LIVING  MEN  AND  WOMEN 

OF  MY  OWN  MIDDLE  WESTERN  HOME  TOWN 

THIS  BOOK  IS  DEDICATED 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 


BOOK   I 


CHAPTER  I 

AT  the  beginning  of  the  long  twilight  of  a  summer 
evening,  Sam  McPherson,  a  tall  big-boned  boy  of  thir 
teen,  with  brown  hair,  black  eyes,  and  an  amusing  little 
habit  of  tilting  his  chin  in  the  air  as  he  walked,  came 
upon  the  station  platform  of  the  little  corn-shipping 
town  of  Caxton  in  Iowa.  It  was  a  board  platform,  and 
the  boy  walked  cautiously,  lifting  his  bare  feet  and  put 
ting  them  down  with  extreme  deliberateness  on  the  hot, 
dry,  cracked  planks.  Under  one  arm  he  carried  a  bundle 
of  newspapers.  A  long  black  cigar  was  in  his  hand. 

In  front  of  the  station  he  stopped;  and  Jerry  Donlin, 
the  baggage-man,  seeing  the  cigar  in  his  hand,  laughed, 
and  slowly  drew  the  side  of  his  face  up  into  a  laboured 
wink. 

"What  is  the  game  to-night,  Sam?"  he  asked. 

Sam  stepped  to  the  baggage-room  door,  handed  him 
the  cigar,  and  began  giving  directions,  pointing  into  the 
baggage-room,  intent  and  business-like  in  the  face  of  the 
Irishman's  laughter.  Then,  turning,  he  walked  across 
the  station  platform  to  the  main  street  of  the  town,  his 
eyes  bent  on  the  ends  of  his  fingers  on  which  he  was 
making  computations  with  his  thumb.  Jerry  looked  after 
him,  grinning  so  that  his  red  gums  made  a  splash  of  col 
our  on  his  bearded  face.  A  gleam  of  paternal  pride  lit  his 
eyes  and  he  shook  his  head  and  muttered  admiringly. 
Then,  lighting  the  cigar,  he  went  down  the  platform  to 

9 


io  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

where  a  wrapped  bundle  of  newspapers  lay  against  the 
building,  under  the  window  of  the  telegraph  office,  and 
taking  it  in  his  arm  disappeared,  still  grinning,  into  the 
baggage-room. 

Sam  McPherson  walked  down  Main  Street,  past  the 
shoe  store,  the  bakery,  and  the  candy  store  kept  by  Penny 
Hughes,  toward  a  group  lounging  at  the  front  of  Geiger's 
drug  store.  Before  the  door  of  the  shoe  store  he  paused 
a  moment,  and  taking  a  small  note-book  from  his  pocket 
ran  his  finger  down  the  pages,  then  shaking  his  head  con 
tinued  on  his  way,  again  absorbed  in  doing  sums  on  his 
fingers. 

Suddenly,  from  among  the  men  by  the  drug  store,  a 
roaring  song  broke  the  evening  quiet  of  the  street,  and 
a  voice,  huge  and  guttural,  brought  a  smile  to  the  boy's 
lips: 

"He  washed  the  windows  and  he  swept  the  floor, 
And  he  polished  up  the  handle  of  the  big  front  door. 
He  polished  that  handle  so  carefullee, 
That  now  he's  the  ruler  of  the  queen's  navee." 

The  singer,  a  short  man  with  grotesquely  wide  shoul 
ders,  wore  a  long  flowing  moustache,  and  a  black  coat, 
covered  with  dust,  that  reached  to  his  knees.  He  held  a 
smoking  briar  pipe  in  his  hand,  and  with  it  beat  time  for 
a  row  of  men  sitting  on  a  long  stone  under  the  store  win 
dow  and  pounding  on  the  sidewalk  with  their  heels  to 
make  a  chorus  for  the  song.  Sam's  smile  broadened  into 
a  grin  as  he  looked  at  the  singer,  Freedom  Smith,  a 
buyer  of  butter  and  eggs,  and  past  him  at  John  Telfer, 
the  orator,  the  dandy,  the  only  man  in  town,  except  Mike 
McCarthy,  who  kept  his  trousers  creased.  Among  all 
the  men  of  Caxton,  Sam  most  admired  John  Telfer  and 
in  his  admiration  had  struck  upon  the  town's  high  light. 
Telfer  loved  good  clothes  and  wore  them  with  an  air, 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  n 

and  never  allowed  Caxton  to  see  him  shabbily  or  in 
differently  dressed,  laughingly  declaring  that  it  was  his 
mission  in  life  to  give  tone  to  the  town. 

John  Telfer  had  a  small  income  left  him  by  his  father, 
once  a  banker  in  the  town,  and  in  his  youth  he  had  gone 
to  New  York  to  study  art,  and  later  to  Paris ;  but  lacking 
ability  or  industry  to  get  on  had  come  back  to  Caxton 
where  he  had  married  Eleanor  Millis,  a  prosperous  mil 
liner.  They  were  the  most  successful  married  pair  in 
Caxton,  and  after  years  of  life  together  they  were  still 
in  love;  were  never  indifferent  to  each  other,  and  never 
quarrelled;  Telfer  treated  his  wife  with  as  much  con 
sideration  and  respect  as  though  she  were  a  sweetheart, 
or  a  guest  in  his  house,  and  she,  unlike  most  of  the  wives 
in  Caxton,  never  ventured  to  question  his  goings  and 
comings,  but  left  him  free  to  live  his  own  life  in  his  own 
way  while  she  attended  to  the  millinery  business. 

At  the  age  of  forty-five  John  Telfer  was  a  tall,  slender, 
fine  looking  man,  with  black  hair  and  a  little  black  pointed 
beard,  and  with  something  lazy  and  care-free  in  his  every 
movement  and  impulse.  Dressed  in  white  flannels,  with 
white  shoes,  a  jaunty  cap  upon  his  head,  eyeglasses  hang 
ing  from  a  gold  chain,  and  a  cane  lightly  swinging  from 
his  hand,  he  made  a  figure  that  might  have  passed  un 
noticed  on  the  promenade  before  some  fashionable  sum 
mer  hotel,  but  that  seemed  a  breach  of  the  laws  of  nature 
when  seen  on  the  streets  of  a  corn-shipping  town  in  Iowa. 
And  Telfer  was  aware  of  the  extraordinary  figure  he  cut ; 
it  was  a  part  of  his  programme  of  life.  Now  as  Sam  ap 
proached  he  laid  a  hand  on  Freedom  Smith's  shoulder 
to  check  the  song,  and,  with  his  eyes  twinkling  with  good- 
humour,  began  thrusting  with  his  cane  at  the  boy's  feet. 

"He  will  never  be  ruler  of  the  queen's  navee,"  he 
declared,  laughing  and  following  the  dancing  boy  about 
in  a  wide  circle.  "He  is  a  little  mole  that  works  under 
ground  intent  upon  worms.  The  trick  he  has  of  tilting  up 


12  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

his  nose  is  only  his  way  of  smelling  out  stray  pennies. 
I  have  it  from  Banker  Walker  that  he  brings  a  basket 
of  them  into  the  bank  every  day.  One  of  these  days  he 
will  buy  the  town  and  put  it  into  his  vest  pocket." 

Circling  about  on  the  stone  sidewalk  and  dancing  to 
escape  the  flying  cane,  Sam  dodged  under  the  arm  of 
Valmore,  a  huge  old  blacksmith  with  shaggy  clumps  of 
hair  on  the  back  of  his  hands,  and  sought  refuge  between 
him  and  Freedom  Smith.  The  blacksmith's  hand  stole 
out  and  lay  upon  the  boy's  shoulder.  Telfer,  his  legs 
spread  apart  and  the  cane  hooked  upon  his  arm,  began 
rolling  a  cigarette ;  Geiger,  a  yellow  skinned  man  with  fat 
cheeks  and  with  hands  clasped  over  his  round  paunch, 
smoked  a  black  cigar,  and  as  he  sent  each  puff  into  the 
air,  grunted  forth  his  satisfaction  with  life.  He  was 
wishing  that  Telfer,  Freedom  Smith,  and  Valmore,  in 
stead  of  moving  on  to  their  nightly  nest  at  the  back  of 
Wildman's  grocery,  would  come  into  his  place  for  the 
evening.  He  thought  he  would  like  to  have  the  three  of 
them  there  night  after  night  discussing  the  doings  of  the 
world. 

Quiet  once  more  settled  down  upon  the  sleepy  street. 
Over  Sam's  shoulder,  Valmore  and  Freedom  Smith 
talked  of  the  coming  corn  crop  and  the  growth  and  pros 
perity  of  the  country. 

"Times  are  getting  better  about  here,  but  the  wild 
things  are  almost  gone,"  said  Freedom,  who  in  the  win 
ter  bought  hides  and  pelts. 

The  men  sitting  on  the  stone  beneath  the  window 
watched  with  idle  interest  Telfer's  labours  with  paper  and 
tobacco.  "Young  Henry  Kerns  has  got  married,"  ob 
served  one  of  them,  striving  to  make  talk.  "He  has 
married  a  girl  from  over  Parker  town  way.  She  gives 
lessons  in  painting — china  painting — kind  of  an  artist, 
you  know." 

An  ejaculation  of  disgust  broke  from  Telfer:  his  fin- 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  13 

gers  trembled  and  the  tobacco  that  was  to  have  been  the 
foundation  of  his  evening  smoke  rained  on  the  sidewalk. 

"An  artist !"  he  exclaimed,  his  voice  tense  with  excite 
ment.  "Who  said  artist?  Who  called  her  that?"  He 
glared  fiercely  about.  "Let  us  have  an  end  to  this  blatant 
misuse  of  fine  old  words.  To  say  cf  one  that  he  is  an 
artist  is  to  touch  the  peak  of  praise." 

Throwing  his  cigarette  paper  after  the  scattered  to 
bacco  he  thrust  one  hand  into  his  trouser  pocket.  With 
the  other  he  held  the  cane,  emphasising  his  points  by 
ringing  taps  upon  the  pavement.  Geiger,  taking  the  cigar 
between  his  fingers,  listened  with  open  mouth  to  the  out 
burst  that  followed.  Valmore  and  Freedom  Smith 
dropped  their  conversation  and  with  broad  smiles  upon 
their  faces  gave  attention,  and  Sam  McPherson,  his  eyes 
round  with  wonder  and  admiration,  felt  again  the  thrill 
that  always  ran  through  him  under  the  drum  beats  of 
Telfer's  eloquence. 

"An  artist  is  one  who  hungers  and  thirsts  after  per 
fection,  not  one  who  dabs  flowers  upon  plates  to  choke 
the  gullets  of  diners,"  declared  Telfer,  setting  himself 
for  one  of  the  long  speeches  with  which  he  loved  to  as 
tonish  the  men  of  Caxton,  and  glaring  down  at  those 
seated  upon  the  stone.  "It  is  the  artist  who,  among  all 
men,  has  the  divine  audacity.  Does  he  not  hurl  himself 
into  a  battle  in  which  is  engaged  against  him  all  of  the 
accumulative  genius  of  the  world?" 

Pausing,  he  looked  about  for  an  opponent  upon  whom 
he  might  pour  the  flood  of  his  eloquence,  but  on  all  sides 
smiles  greeted  him.  Undaunted,  he  rushed  again  to  the 
charge. 

"A  business  man — what  is  he?"  he  demanded.  "He 
succeeds  by  outwitting  the  little  minds  with  which  he 
comes  in  contact.  A  scientist  is  of  more  account — he  pits 
his  brains  against  the  dull  unresponsiveness  of  inanimate 
matter  and  a  hundredweight  of  black  iron  he  makes  do 


14  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

the  work  of  a  hundred  housewives.  But  an  artist  tes 
his  brains  against  the  greatest  brains  of  all  times;  1 
stands  upon  the  peak  of  life  and  hurls  himself  again 
the  world.  A  girl  from  Parkertown  who  paints  flowe 
upon  dishes  to  be  called  an  artist — ugh!  Let  me  spe 
forth  the  thought !  Let  me  cleanse  my  mouth !  A  me 
should  have  a  prayer  upon  his  lips  who  utters  the  woi 
artist!" 

"Well,  we  can't  all  be  artists  and  the  woman  can  paii 
flowers  upon  dishes  for  all  I  care,"  spoke  up  Valmor 
laughing  good  naturedly.  "We  can't  all  paint  pictun 
and  write  books." 

"We  do  not  want  to  be  artists — we  do  not  dare  to  be 
shouted  Telfer,  whirling  and  shaking  his  cane  at  Va 
more.  "You  have  a  misunderstanding  of  the  word." 

He  straightened  his  shoulders  and  threw  out  his  che 
and  the  boy  standing  beside  the  blacksmith  threw  up  h 
chin,  unconsciously  imitating  the  swagger  of  the  man. 

"I  do  not  paint  pictures ;  I  do  not  write  books ;  yet  ai 
I  an  artist,"  declared  Telfer,  proudly.  "I  am  an  arti 
practising  the  most  difficult  of  all  arts — the  art  of  livin: 
Here  in  this  western  village  I  stand  and  fling  my  cha 
lenge  to  the  world.  'On  the  lips  of  not  the  greatest  ( 
you/  I  cry,  'has  life  been  more  sweet.' ' 

He  turned  from  Valmore  to  the  men  upon  the  stone. 

"Make  a  study  of  my  life,"  he  commanded.  "It  wi 
be  a  revelation  to  you.  With  a  smile  I  greet  the  mon 
ing ;  I  swagger  in  the  noontime ;  and  in  the  evening,  lil 
Socrates  of  old,  I  gather  a  little  group  of  you  benighte 
villagers  about  me  and  toss  wisdom  into  your  teeth,  strr 
ing  to  teach  you  judgment  in  the  use  of  great  words." 

"You  talk  an  almighty  lot  about  yourself,  John,"  grun 
bled  Freedom  Smith,  taking  his  pipe  from  his  mouth. 

"The  subject  is  complex,  it  is  varied,  it  is  full  c 
charm,"  Telfer  answered,  laughing. 

Taking  a  fresh  supply  of  tobacco  and  paper  from  h 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  15 

pocket,  he  rolled  and  lighted  a  cigarette.  His  fingers  no 
longer  trembled.  Flourishing  his  cane  he  threw  back  his 
head  and  blew  smoke  into  the  air.  He  thought  that  in 
spite  of  the  roar  of  laughter  that  had  greeted  Freedom 
Smith's  comment,  he  had  vindicated  the  honour  of  art 
and  the  thought  made  him  happy. 

To  the  newsboy,  who  had  been  leaning  against  the 
storefront  lost  in  admiration,  it  seemed  that  he  had 
caught  in  Telfer's  talk  an  echo  of  the  kind  of  talk  that 
must  go  on  among  men  in  the  big  outside  world.  Had 
not  this  Telfer  travelled  far?  Had  he  not  lived  in  New 
York  and  Paris?  Without  understanding  the  sense  of 
what  had  been  said,  Sam  felt  that  it  must  be  something 
big  and  conclusive.  When  from  the  distance  there  came 
the  shriek  of  a  locomotive,  he  stood  unmoved,  trying  to 
comprehend  the  meaning  of  Telfer's  outburst  over  the 
lounger's  simple  statement. 

"There's  the  seven  forty-five,"  cried  Telfer,  sharply. 
"Is  the  war  between  you  and  Fatty  at  an  end  ?  Are  we 
going  to  lose  our  evening's  diversion?  Has  Fatty  bluffed 
you  out  or  are  you  growing  rich  and  lazy  like  Papa 
Geiger  here?" 

Springing  from  his  place  beside  the  blacksmith  and 
grasping  the  bundle  of  newspapers,  Sam  ran  down  the 
street,  Telfer,  Valmore,  Freedom  Smith  and  the  loungers 
following  more  slowly. 

When  the  evening  train  from  Des  Moines  stopped  at 
Caxton,  a  blue-coated  train  news  merchant  leaped  hur 
riedly  to  the  platform  and  began  looking  anxiously  about. 

"Hurry,  Fatty,"  rang  out  Freedom  Smith's  huge  voice, 
"Sam's  already  half  through  one  car." 

The  young  man  called  "Fatty"  ran  up  and  down  the 
station  platform.  "Where  is  that  bundle  of  Omaha  pa 
pers,  you  Irish  loafer?"  he  shouted,  shaking  his  fist  at 
Jerry  Donlin  who  stood  upon  a  truck  at  the  front  of 
the  train,  up-ending  trunks  into  the  baggage  car. 


16  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

Jerry  paused  with  a  trunk  dangling  in  mid-air.  "In 
the  baggage-room,  of  course.  Hurry,  man.  Do  you 
want  the  kid  to  work  the  whole  train?" 

An  air  of  something  impending  hung  over  the  idlers 
upon  the  platform,  the  train  crew,  and  even  the  travelling 
men  who  began  climbing  off  the  train.  The  engineer 
thrust  his  head  out  of  the  cab;  the  conductor,  a  dignified 
looking  man  with  a  grey  moustache,  threw  back  his  head 
and  shook  with  mirth ;  a  young  man  with  a  suit-case  in 
his  hand  and  a  long  pipe  in  his  mouth  ran  to  the  door  of 
the  baggage-room,  calling,  "Hurry !  Hurry,  Fatty !  The 
kid  is  working  the  entire  train.  You  won't  be  able  to  sell 
a  paper." 

The  fat  young  man  ran  from  the  baggage-room  to  the 
platform  and  shouted  again  to  Jerry  Donlin,  who  was 
now  slowly  pushing  the  empty  truck  along  the  platform. 
From  the  train  came  a  clear  voice  calling,  "Latest  Omaha 
papers !  Have  your  change  ready !  Fatty,  the  train  news 
boy,  has  fallen  down  a  well !  Have  your  change  ready, 
gentlemen !" 

Jerry  Donlin,  followed  by  Fatty,  again  disappeared 
from  sight.  The  conductor,  waving  his  hand,  jumped 
upon  the  steps  of  the  train.  The  engineer  pulled  in  his 
head  and  the  train  began  to  move. 

The  fat  young  man  emerged  from  the  baggage- 
room,  swearing  revenge  upon  the  head  of  Jerry  Donlin. 
"There  was  no  need  to  put  it  under  a  mail  sack!"  he 
shouted,  shaking  his  fist.  "I'll  be  even  with  you  for 
this." 

Followed  by  the  shouts  of  the  travelling  men  and  the 
laughter  of  the  idlers  upon  the  platform  he  climbed  upon 
the  moving  train  and  began  running  from  car  to  car. 
Off  the  last  car  dropped  Sam  McPherson,  a  smile  upon 
his  lips,  the  bundle  of  newspapers  gone,  his  pocket  jin 
gling  with  coins.  The  evening's  entertainment  for  the 
town  of  Caxton  was  at  an  end. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  17 

John  Telfer,  standing  by  the  side  of  Valmore,  waved 
his  cane  in  the  air  and  began  talking. 

"Beat  him  again,  by  Gad!"  he  exclaimed.  "Bully  for 
Sam !  Who  says  the  spirit  of  the  old  buccaneers  is  dead? 
That  boy  didn't  understand  what  I  said  about  art,  but 
he  is  an  artist  just  the  same !" 


CHAPTER  II 

WINDY  MCPHERSON,  the  father  of  the  Caxton  news 
boy,  Sam  McPherson,  had  been  war  touched.  The 
civilian  clothes  that  he  wore  caused  an  itching  of  the 
skin.  He  could  not  forget  that  he  had  once  been  a 
sergeant  in  a  regiment  of  infantry  and  had  commanded 
a  company  through  a  battle  fought  in  ditches  along  a 
Virginia  country  road.  He  chafed  under  the  fact  of  his 
present  obscure  position  in  life.  Had  he  been  able  to 
replace  his  regimentals  with  the  robes  of  a  judge,  the  felt 
hat  of  a  statesman,  or  even  with  the  night  stick  of  a  vil 
lage  marshal  life  might  have  retained  something  of  its 
sweetness,  but  to  have  ended  by  becoming  an  obscure 
housepainter  in  a  village  that  lived  by  raising  corn  and 
by  feeding  that  corn  to  red  steers — ugh! — the  thought 
made  him  shudder.  He  looked  with  envy  at  the  blue  coat 
and  the  brass  buttons  of  the  railroad  agent;  he  tried 
vainly  to  get  into  the  Caxton  Cornet  Band ;  he  got  drunk 
to  forget  his  humiliation  and  in  the  end  he  fell  to  loud 
boasting  and  to  the  nursing  of  a  belief  within"  himself 
that  in  truth  not  Lincoln  nor  Grant  but  he  himself  had 
thrown  the  winning  die  in  the  great  struggle.  In  his 
cups  he  said  as  much  and  the  Caxton  corn  grower,  punch 
ing  his  neighbour  in  the  ribs,  shook  with  delight  over  the 
statement. 

When  Sam  was  a  twelve  year  old,  barefooted  boy  upon 
the  streets  a  kind  of  backwash  of  the  wave  of  glory  that 
had  swept  over  Windy  McPherson  in  the  days  of  '61 
lapped  upon  the  shores  of  the  Iowa  village.  That  strange 
manifestation  called  the  A.  P.  A.  movement  brought  the 

18 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  19 

old  soldier  to  a  position  of  prominence  in  the  community. 
He  founded  a  local  branch  of  the  organisation;  he 
marched  at  the  head  of  a  procession  through  the  streets; 
he  stood  on  a  corner  and  pointing  a  trembling  forefinger 
to  where  the  flag  on  the  schoolhouse  waved  beside  the 
cross  of  Rome,  shouted  hoarsely,  "See,  the  cross  rears 
itself  above  the  flag!  We  shall  end  by  being  murdered 
in  our  beds!" 

But  although  some  of  the  hard-headed,  money-making 
men  of  Caxton  joined  the  movement  started  by  the  boast 
ing  old  soldier  and  although  for  the  moment  they  vied 
with  him  in  stealthy  creepings  through  the  streets  to  secret 
meetings  and  in  mysterious  mutterings  behind  hands  the 
movement  subsided  as  suddenly  as  it  had  begun  and 
only  left  its  leader  more  desolate. 

In  the  little  house  at  the  end  of  the  street  by  the  shores 
of  Squirrel  Creek,  Sam  and  his  sister  Kate  regarded  their 
father's  warlike  pretensions  with  scorn.  "The  butter  is 
low,  father's  army  leg  will  ache  to-night,"  they  whispered 
to  each  other  across  the  kitchen  table. 

Following  her  mother's  example,  Kate,  a  tall  slender 
girl  of  sixteen  and  already  a  bread  winner  with  a  clerk 
ship  in  Winney's  drygoods  store,  remained  silent  under 
Windy's  boasting,  but  Sam,  striving  to  emulate  them, 
did  not  always  succeed.  There  was  now  and  then  a 
rebellious  muttering  that  should  have  warned  Windy. 
It  had  once  burst  into  an  open  quarrel  in  which  the 
victor  of  a  hundred  battles  withdrew  defeated  from 
the  field.  Windy,  half -drunk,  had  taken  an  old  account 
book  from  a  shelf  in  the  kitchen,  a  relic  of  his  days  as 
a  prosperous  merchant  when  he  had  first  come  to  Caxton, 
and  had  begun  reading  to  the  little  family  a  list  of  names 
of  men  who,  he  claimed,  had  been  the  cause  of  his  ruin. 

"There  is  Tom  Newman,  now,"  he  exclaimed  excitedly. 
"Owns  a  hundred  acres  of  good  corn-growing  land  and 
won't  pay  for  the  harness  on  the  backs  of  his  horses  or 


20  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

for  the  ploughs  in  his  barn.  The  receipt  he  has  from  me 
is  forged.  I  could  put  him  in  prison  if  I  chose.  To  beat 
an  old  soldier! — to  beat  one  of  the  boys  of  '61 ! — it  is 
shameful!" 

"I  have  heard  of  what  you  owed  and  what  men  owed 
you;  you  had  none  the  worst  of  it,"  Sam  protested  coldly, 
while  Kate  held  her  breath  and  Jane  McPherson,  at  work 
over  the  ironing  board  in  the  corner,  half  turned  and 
looked  silently  at  the  man  and  the  boy,  the  slightly  in 
creased  pallor  of  her  long  face  the  only  sign  that  she 
had  heard. 

Windy  had  not  pressed  the  quarrel.  Standing  for  a 
moment  in  the  middle  of  the  kitchen,  holding  the  book  in 
his  hand,  he  looked  from  the  pale  silent  mother  by  the 
ironing  board  to  the  son  now  standing  and  staring  at  him, 
and,  throwing  the  book  upon  the  table  with  a  bang,  fled 
the  house.  "You  don't  understand/'  he  had  cried,  "you 
don't  understand  the  heart  of  a  soldier." 

In  a  way  the  man  was  right.  The  two  children  did  not 
understand  the  blustering,  pretending,  inefficient  old  man. 
Having  moved  shoulder  to  shoulder  with  grim,  silent  men 
to  the  consummation  of  great  deeds  Windy  could  not  get 
the  flavour  of  those  days  out  of  his  outlook  upon  life. 
Walking  half  drunk  in  the  darkness  along  the  sidewalks 
of  Caxton  on  the  evening  of  the  quarrel  the  man  became 
inspired.  He  threw  back  his  shoulders  and  walked  with 
martial  tread;  he  drew  an  imaginary  sword  from  its 
scabbard  and  waved  it  aloft ;  stopping,  he  aimed  carefully 
at  a  body  of  imaginary  men  who  advanced  yelling 
toward  him  across  a  wheatfield ;  he  felt  that  life  in  mak 
ing  him  a  house  painter  in  a  farming  village  in  Iowa  and 
in  giving  him  an  unappreciative  son  had  been  cruelly  un 
fair;  he  wept  at  the  injustice  of  it. 

The  American  Civil  War  was  a  thing  so  passionate,  so 
inflaming,  so  vast,  so  absorbing,  it  so  touched  to  the  quick 
the  men  and  women  of  those  pregnant  days  that  but  a 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  21 

faint  echo  of  it  has  been  able  to  penetrate  down  to  our 
days  and  to  our  minds;  no  real  sense  of  it  has  as  yet 
crept  into  the  pages  of  a  printed  book;  it  yet  wants  its 
Thomas  Carlyle;  and  in  the  end  we  are  put  to  the  need 
of  listening  to  old  fellows  boasting  on  our  village  streets 
to  get  upon  our  cheeks  the  living  breath  of  it.  For  four 
years  the  men  of  American  cities,  villages  and  farms 
walked  across  the  smoking  embers  of  a  burning  land,  ad 
vancing  and  receding  as  the  flame  of  that  universal,  pas 
sionate,  death-spitting  thing  swept  down  upon  them  or 
receded  toward  the  smoking  sky-line.  Is  it  so  strange 
that  they  could  not  come  home  and  begin  again  peace 
fully  painting  houses  or  mending  broken  shoes?  A 
something  in  them  cried  out.  It  sent  them  to  bluster  and 
boast  upon  the  street  corners.  When  people  passing  con 
tinued  to  think  only  of  their  brick  laying  and  of  their 
shovelling  of  corn  into  cars,  when  the  sons  of  these  war 
gods  walking  home  at  evening  and  hearing  the  vain 
boastings  of  the  fathers  began  to  doubt  even  the  facts  of 
the  great  struggle,  a  something  snapped  in  their  brains 
and  they  fell  to  chattering  and  shouting  their  vain  boast 
ings  to  all  as  they  looked  hungrily  about  for  believing 
eyes. 

When  our  own  Thomas  Carlyle  comes  to  write  of  our 
Civil  War  he  will  make  much  of  our  Windy  McPhersons. 
He  will  see  something  big  and  pathetic  in  their  hungry 
search  for  auditors  and  in  their  endless  war  talk.  He 
will  go  filled  with  eager  curiosity  into  little  G.  A.  R. 
halls  in  the  villages  and  think  of  the  men  who  coming 
there  night  after  night,  year  after  year,  told  and  re-told 
endlessly,  monotonously,  their  story  of  battle. 

Let  us  hope  that  in  his  fervour  for  the  old  fellows  he 
will  not  fail  to  treat  tenderly  the  families  of  those  veteran 
talkers;  the  families  that  with  their  breakfasts  and  their 
dinners,  by  the  fire  at  evening,  through  fast  day  and  feast 
day,  at  weddings  and  at  funerals  got  again  and  again  end- 


as  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

lessly,  everlastingly  this  flow  of  war  words.  Let  him 
reflect  that  peaceful  men  in  corn-growing  counties  do  not 
by  choice  sleep  among  the  dogs  of  war  nor  wash  their 
linen  in  the  blood  of  their  country's  foe.  Let  him,  in 
his  sympathy  with  the  talkers,  remember  with  kindness 
the  heroism  of  the  listeners. 

On  a  summer  day  Sam  McPherson  sat  on  a  box  before 
Wildman's  grocery  lost  in  thought.  In  his  hand  he  held 
the  little  yellow  account  book  and  in  this  he  buried  him 
self,  striving  to  wipe  from  his  consciousness  a  scene  be 
ing  enacted  before  his  eyes  upon  the  street. 

The  realisation  of  the  fact  that  his  father  was  a  con 
firmed  liar  and  braggart  had  for  years  cast  a  shadow 
over  his  days  and  the  shadow  had  been  made  blacker  by 
the  fact  that  in  a  land  where  the  least  fortunate  can  laugh 
in  the  face  of  want  he  had  more  than  once  stood  face 
to  face  with  poverty.  He  believed  that  the  logical  an 
swer  to  the  situation  was  money  in  the  bank  and  with  all 
the  ardour  of  his  boy's  heart  he  strove  to  realise  that  an 
swer.  He  wanted  to  be  a  money-maker  and  the  totals  at 
the  foot  of  the  pages  in  the  soiled  yellow  bankbook  were 
the  milestones  that  marked  the  progress  he  had  already 
made.  They  told  him  that  the  daily  struggles  with  Fatty, 
the  long  tramps  through  Caxton's  streets  on  bleak  winter 
evenings,  and  the  never-ending  Saturday  nights  when 
crowds  filled  the  stores,  the  sidewalks,  and  the  drinking 
places,  and  he  worked  among  them  tirelessly  and  per 
sistently  were  not  without  fruit. 

Suddenly,  above  the  murmur  of  men's  voices  on  the 
street,  his  father's  voice  rose  loud  and  insistent.  A  block 
further  down  the  street,  leaning  against  the  door  of 
Hunter's  jewelry  store,  Windy  talked  at  the  top  of  his 
lungs,  pumping  his  arms  up  and  down  with  the  air  of 
a  man  making  a  stump  speech. 

"He  is  making  a  fool  of  himself,"  thought  Sam,  and 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  23 

returned  to  his  bank  book,  striving  in  the  contemplation 
of  the  totals  at  the  foot  of  the  pages  to  shake  off  the  dull 
anger  that  had  begun  to  burn  in  his  brain.  Glancing 
up  again,  he  saw  that  Joe  Wildman,  son  of  the  grocer 
and  a  boy  of  his  own  age,  had  joined  the  group  of  men 
laughing  and  jeering  at  Windy.  The  shadow  on  Sam's 
face  grew  heavier. 

Sam  had  been  at  Joe  Wildman's  house;  he  knew  the 
air  of  plenty  and  of  comfort  that  hung  over  it;  the  table 
piled  high  with  meat  and  potatoes;  the  group  of  children 
laughing  and  eating  to  the  edge  of  gluttony;  the  quiet, 
gentle  father  who  amid  the  clamour  and  the  noise  did 
not  raise  his  voice,  and  the  well-dressed,  bustling,  rosy- 
cheeked  mother.  As  a  contrast  to  this  scene  he  began 
to  call  up  in  his  mind  a  picture  of  life  in  his  own  home, 
getting  a  kind  of  perverted  pleasure  out  of  his  dissatis 
faction  with  it.  He  saw  the  boasting,  incompetent  father 
telling  his  endless  tales  of  the  Civil  War  and  complain 
ing  of  his  wounds;  the  tall,  stoop-shouldered,  silent 
mother  with  the  deep  lines  in  her  long  face,  everlastingly 
at  work  over  her  wash-tub  among  the  soiled  clothes ;  the 
silent,  hurriedly-eaten  meals  snatched  from  the  kitchen 
table;  and  the  long  winter  days  when  ice  formed  upon 
his  mother's  skirts  and  Windy  idled  about  town  while 
the  little  family  subsisted  upon  bowls  of  cornmeal  mush 
everlastingly  repeated. 

Now,  even  from  where  he  sat,  he  could  see  that  his 
father  was  half  gone  in  drink,  and  knew  that  he  was 
boasting  of  his  part  in  the  Civil  War.  "He  is  either 
doing  that  or  telling  of  his  aristocratic  family  or  lying 
about  his  birthplace,"  he  thought  resentfully,  and  unable 
any  longer  to  endure  the  sight  of  what  seemed  to  him 
his  own  degradation,  he  got  up  and  went  into  the  grocery 
where  a  group  of  Caxton  citizens  stood  talking  to  Wild 
man  of  a  meeting  to  be  held  that  morning  at  the  town 
hall. 


24  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

Caxton  was  to  have  a  Fourth  of  July  celebration.  The 
idea,  born  in  the  heads  of  the  few,  had  been  taken  up 
by  the  many.  Rumours  of  it  had  run  through  the  streets 
late  in  May.  It  had  been  talked  of  in  Geiger's  drug 
store,  at  the  back  of  Wildman's  grocery,  and  in  the  street 
before  the  New  Leland  House.  John  Telfer,  the  town's 
one  man  of  leisure,  had  for  weeks  been  going  from  place 
to  place  discussing  the  details  with  prominent  men.  Now 
a  mass  meeting  was  to  be  held  in  the  hall  over  Geiger's 
drug  store  and  to  a  man  the  citizens  of  Ca_xton  had  turned 
out  for  the  meeting.  The  housepainter  had  come  down 
off  his  ladder,  the  clerks  were  locking  the  doors  of  the 
stores,  men  went  along  the  streets  in  groups  bound  for 
the  hall.  As  they  went  they  shouted  to  each  other.  "The 
old  town  has  woke  up,"  they  called. 

On  a  corner  by  Hunter's  Jewelry  Store  Windy  Mc- 
Pherson  leaned  against  a  building  and  harangued  the 
passing  crowd. 

"Let  the  old  flag  wave,"  he  shouted  excitedly,  "let 
the  men  of  Caxton  show  the  true  blue  and  rally  to  the 
old  standards." 

"That's  right,  Windy,  expostulate  with  them,"  shouted 
a  wit,  and  a  roar  of  laughter  drowned  Windy's  reply. 

Sam  McPherson  also  went  to  the  meeting  in  the  hall. 
He  came  out  of  the  grocery  store  with  Wildman  and 
went  along  the  street  looking  at  the  sidewalk  and  trying 
not  to  see  the  drunken  man  talking  in  front  of  the  jewelry 
store.  At  the  hall  other  boys  stood  in  the  stairway  or 
ran  up  and  down  the  sidewalk  talking  excitedly,  but  Sam 
was  a  figure  in  the  town's  life  and  his  right  to  push  in 
among  the  men  was  not  questioned.  He  squirmed 
through  the  mass  of  legs  and  secured  a  seat  in  a  window 
ledge  where  he  could  watch  the  men  come  in  and  find 
seats. 

As  Caxton's  one  newsboy  Sam  had  got  from  his  news- 
elb'nrf  bofh  a  living  and  a  kind  of  stnnding  in  the 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  25 

town's  life.  To  be  a  newsboy  or  a  bootblack  in  a  small 
novel-reading  American  town  is  to  make  a  figure  in  the 
world.  Do  not  all  of  the  poor  newsboys  in  the  books  be 
come  great  men  and  is  not  this  boy  who  goes  among  us 
so  industriously  day  after  day  likely  to  become  such  a 
figure?  Is  it  not  a  duty  we  of  the  town  owe  to  future 
greatness  that  we  push  him  forward?  So  reasoned  the 
men  of  Caxton  and  paid  a  kind  of  court  to  the  boy  who 
sat  on  the  window  ledge  of  the  hall  while  the  other  boys 
of  the  town  waited  on  the  sidewalk  below. 

John  Telfer  was  chairman  of  the  mass  meeting.  He 
was  always  chairman  of  public  meetings  in  Caxton.  The 
industrious  silent  men  of  position  in  the  town  envied  his 
easy,  bantering  style  of  public  address,  while  pretend 
ing  to  treat  it  with  scorn.  "He  talks  too  much,"  they 
said,  making  a  virtue  of  their  own  inability  with  apt  and 
clever  words. 

Telfer  did  not  wait  to  be  appointed  chairman  of  the 
meeting,  but  went  forward,  climbed  the  little  raised  plat 
form  at  the  end  of  the  hall,  and  usurped  the  chairman 
ship.  He  walked  up  and  down  on  the  platform  banter 
ing  with  the  crowd,  answering  gibes,  calling  to  well- 
known  men,  getting  and  giving  keen  satisfaction  with 
his  talent.  When  the  hall  was  filled  with  men  he  called 
the  meeting  to  order,  appointed  committees  and  launched 
into  a  harangue.  He  told  of  plans  made  to  advertise  the 
big  day  in  other  towns  and  to  get  low  railroad  rates  ar 
ranged  for  excursion  parties.  The  programme,  he  said, 
included  a  musical  carnival  with  brass  bands  from  other 
towns,  a  sham  battle  by  the  military  company  at  the  fair 
grounds,  horse  races,  speeches  from  the  steps  of  the  town 
hall,  and  fireworks  in  the  evening.  "We'll  show  them  a 
live  town  here,"  he  declared,  walking  up  and  down  the 
platform  and  swinging  his  cane,  while  the  crowd  ap 
plauded  and  shouted  its  approval. 

When  a  call  came  for  voluntary  subscriptions  to  pay 


26  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

for  the  fun,  the  audience  quieted  down.  One  or  two 
men  got  up  and  started  to  go  out,  grumbling  that  it  was 
a  waste  of  money.  The  fate  of  the  celebration  was  on 
the  knees  of  the  gods. 

Telfer  arose  to  the  occasion.  He  called  out  the  names 
of  the  departing,  and  made  jests  at  their  expense  so  that 
they  dropped  back  into  their  chairs  unable  to  face  the 
roaring  laughter  of  the  crowd,  and  shouted  to  a  man  at 
the  back  of  the  hall  to  close  and  bolt  the  door.  Men  be 
gan  getting  up  in  various  parts  of  the  hall  and  calling 
out  sums,  Telfer  repeating  the  name  and  the  amount  in 
a  loud  voice  to  young  Tom  Jedrow,  clerk  in  the  bank, 
who  wrote  them  down  in  a  book.  When  the  amount 
subscribed  did  not  meet  with  his  approval,  he  protested 
and  the  crowd  backing  him  up  forced  the  increase  he  de 
manded.  When  a  man  did  not  rise,  he  shouted  at  him 
and  the  man  answered  back  an  amount. 

Suddenly  in  the  hall  a  diversion  arose.  Windy  Mc- 
Pherson  emerged  from  the  crowd  at  the  back  of  the 
hall  and  walked  down  the  centre  aisle  to  the  platform. 
He  walked  unsteadily  straightening  his  shoulders  and 
thrusting  out  his  chin.  When  he  got  to  the  front  of  the 
hall  he  took  a  roll  of  bills  from  his  pocket  and  threw  it 
on  the  platform  at  the  chairman's  feet.  "From  one  of 
the  boys  of  '61,"  he  announced  in  a  loud  voice. 

The  crowd  shouted  and  clapped  its  hands  with  delight 
as  Telfer  picked  up  the  bills  and  ran  his  finger  over  them. 
"Seventeen  dollars  from  our  hero,  the  mighty  McPher- 
son,"  he  shouted  while  the  bank  clerk  wrote  the  name 
and  the  amount  in  the  book  and  the  crowd  continued  to 
make  merry  over  the  title  given  the  drunken  soldier  by 
the  chairman. 

The  boy  on  the  window  ledge  slipped  to  the  floor  and 
stood  with  burning  cheeks  behind  the  mass  of  men.  He 
knew  that  at  home  his  mother  was  doing  a  family  wash 
ing  for  Lesley,  the  shoe  merchant,  who  had  given  five 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  27 

dollars  to  the  Fourth-of-July  fund,  and  the  resentment 
he  had  felt  on  seeing  his  father  talking  to  the  crowd  be 
fore  the  jewelry  store  blazed  up  anew. 

After  the  taking  of  subscriptions,  men  in  various  parts 
of  the  hall  began  making  suggestions  for  added  features 
for  the  great  day.  To  some  of  the  speakers  the  crowd 
listened  respectfully,  at  others  they  hooted.  An  old  man 
with  a  grey  beard  told  a  long  rambling  story  of  a  Fourth- 
of-July  celebration  of  his  boyhood.  When  voices  inter 
rupted  he  protested  and  shook  his  fist  in  the  air,  pale 
with  indignation. 

"Oh,  sit  down,  old  daddy,"  shouted  Freedom  Smith 
and  a  murmur  of  applause  greeted  this  sensible  sugges 
tion. 

Another  man  got  up  and  began  to  talk.  He  had  an 
idea.  "We  will  have/'  he  said,  "a  bugler  mounted  on 
a  white  horse  who  will  ride  through  the  town  at  dawn 
blowing  the  reveille.  At  midnight  he  will  stand  on  the 
steps  of  the  town  hall  and  blow  taps  to  end  the  day." 

The  crowd  applauded.  The  idea  had  caught  their 
fancy  and  had  instantly  taken  a  place  in  their  minds  as 
one  of  the  real  events  of  the  day. 

Again  Windy  McPherson  emerged  from  the  crowd  at 
the  back  of  the  hall.  Raising  his  hand  for  silence  he 
told  the  crowd  that  he  was  a  bugler,  that  he  had  been  a 
regimental  bugler  for  two  years  during  the  Civil  War. 
He  said  that  he  would  gladly  volunteer  for  the  place. 

The  crowd  shouted  and  John  Telfer  waved  his  hand. 
"The  white  horse  for  you,  McPherson/*  he  said. 

Sam  McPherson  wriggled  along  the  wall  and  out  at 
the  now  unbolted  door.  He  was  filled  with  astonishment 
at  his  father's  folly,  and  was  still  more  astonished  at 
the  folly  of  these  other  men  in  accepting  his  statement 
and  handing  over  the  important  place  for  the  big  day. 
He  knew  that  his  father  must  have  had  some  part  in 
the  war  as  he  was  a  member  of  the  G.  A.  R.,  but  he  had 


28  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

no  faith  at  all  in  the  stories  he  had  heard  him  relate  of 
his  experiences  in  the  war.  Sometimes  he  caught  him 
self  wondering  if  there  ever  had  been  such  a  war  and 
thought  that  it  must  be  a  lie  like  everything  else  in  the 
life  of  Windy  McPherson.  For  years  he  had  wondered 
why  some  sensible  solid  person  like  Valmore  or  Wildman 
did  not  rise,  and  in  a  matter-of-fact  way  tell  the  world 
that  no  such  thing  as  the  Civil  War  had  ever  been  fought, 
that  it  was  merely  a  figment  in  the  minds  of  pompous  old 
men  demanding  unearned  glory  of  their  fellows.  Now 
hurrying  along  the  street  with  burning  cheeks,  he  decided 
that  after  all  there  must  have  been  such  a  war.  He  had 
had  the  same  feeling  about  birthplaces  and  there  could 
be  no  doubt  that  people  were  born.  He  had  heard  his 
father  claim  as  his  birthplace  Kentucky,  Texas,  North 
Carolina,  Louisiana  and  Scotland.  The  thing  had  left  a 
kind  of  defect  in  his  mind.  To  the  end  of  his  life  when 
he  heard  a  man  tell  the  place  of  his  birth  he  looked  up 
suspiciously,  and  a  shadow  of  doubt  crossed  his  mind. 

From  the  mass  meeting  Sam  went  home  to  his  mother 
and  presented  the  case  bluntly.  "The  thing  will  have  to 
be  stopped,'*  he  declared,  standing  with  blazing  eyes  be 
fore  her  washtub.  "It  is  too  public.  He  can't  blow 
a  bugle ;  I  know  he  can't.  The  whole  town  will  have  an 
other  laugh  at  our  expense." 

Jane  McPherson  listened  in  silence  to  the  boy's  out 
burst,  then,  turning,  went  back  to  rubbing  clothes,  avoid 
ing  his  eyes. 

With  his  hands  thrust  into  his  trousers  pocket  Sam 
stared  sullenly  at  the  ground.  A  sense  of  justice  told 
him  not  to  press  the  matter,  but  as  he  walked  away  from 
the  wash  tub  and  out  at  the  kitchen  door,  he  hoped  there 
would  be  plain  talk  of  the  matter  at  supper  time.  "The 
old  fool !"  he  protested,  addressing  the  empty  street.  "He 
is  going  to  make  a  show  of  himself  again." 

When  Windy  McPherson  came  home  that  evening, 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  29 

something  in  the  eyes  of  the  silent  wife,  and  the  sullen 
face  of  the  boy,  startled  him.  He  passed  over  lightly  his 
wife's  silence  but  looked  closely  at  his  son.  He  felt  that 
he  faced  a  crisis.  In  the  emergency  he  was  magnificent. 
With  a  flourish,  he  told  of  the  mass  meeting,  and  de 
clared  that  the  citizens  of  Caxton  had  arisen  as  one  man 
to  demand  that  he  take  the  responsible  place  as  official 
bugler.  Then,  turning,  he  glared  across  the  table  at  his 
son. 

Sam,  openly  defiant,  announced  that  he  did  not  be 
lieve  his  father  capable  of  blowing  a  bugle. 

Windy  roared  with  amazement.  He  rose  from  the 
table  declaring  in  a  loud  voice  that  the  boy  had  wronged 
him ;  he  swore  that  he  had  been  for  two  years  bugler  on 
the  staff  of  a  colonel,  and  launched  into  a  long  story  of 
a  surprise  by  the  enemy  while  his  regiment  lay  asleep  in 
their  tents,  and  of  his  standing  in  the  face  of  a  storm 
of  bullets  and  blowing  his  comrades  to  action.  Putting 
one  hand  on  his  forehead  he  rocked  back  and  forth  as 
though  about  to  fall,  declaring  that  he  was  striving  to 
keep  back  the  tears  wrenched  from  him  by  the  injustice 
of  his  son's  insinuation  and,  shouting  so  that  his  voice 
carried  far  down  the  street,  he  declared  with  an  oath 
that  the  town  of  Caxton  should  ring  and  echo  with  his 
bugling  as  the  sleeping  camp  had  echoed  with  it  that 
night  in  the  Virginia  wood.  Then  dropping  again  into 
his  chair,  and  resting  his  head  upon  his  hand,  he  assumed 
a  look  of  patient  resignation. 

Windy  McPherson  was  victorious.  In  the  little  house 
a  great  stir  and  bustle  of  preparation  arose.  Putting  on 
his  white  overalls  and  forgetting  for  the  time  his  honour 
able  wounds  the  father  went  day  after  day  to  his  work 
as  a  housepainter.  He  dreamed  of  a  new  blue  uniform 
for  the  great  day  and  in  the  end  achieved  the  realisation 
of  his  dreams,  not  however  without  material  assistance 
from  what  was  known  in  the  house  as  "Mother's  Wash 


30  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

Money."  And  the  boy,  convinced  by  the  story  of  the 
midnight  attack  in  the  woods  of  Virginia,  began  against 
his  judgment  to  build  once  more  an  old  dream  of  his 
father's  reformation.  Boylike,  the  scepticism  was  thrown 
to  the  winds  and  he  entered  with  zeal  into  the  plans  for 
the  great  day.  As  he  went  through  the  quiet  residence 
streets  delivering  the  late  evening  papers,  he  threw  back 
his  head  and  revelled  in  the  thought  of  a  tall  blue-clad 
figure  on  a  great  white  horse  passing  like  a  knight  before 
the  gaping  people.  In  a  fervent  moment  he  even  drew 
money  from  his  carefully  built-up  bank  account  and  sent 
it  to  a  firm  in  Chicago  to  pay  for  a  shining  new  bugle 
that  would  complete  the  picture  he  had  in  his  mind.  And 
when  the  evening  papers  were  distributed  he  hurried  home 
to  sit  on  the  porch  before  the  house  discussing  with  his 
sister  Kate  the  honours  that  had  alighted  upon  their 
family. 

•  •••••• 

With  the  coming  of  dawn  on  the  great  day  the  three 
McPhersons  hurried  hand  in  hand  toward  Main  Street. 
In  the  street,  on  all  sides  of  them,  they  saw  people  coming 
out  of  houses  rubbing  their  eyes  and  buttoning  their  coats 
as  they  went  along  the  sidewalk.  All  of  Caxton  seemed 
abroad. 

In  Main  Street  the  people  were  packed  on  the  side 
walk,  and  massed  on  the  curb  and  in  the  doorways  of 
the  stores.  Heads  appeared  at  windows,  flags  waved 
from  roofs  or  hung  from  ropes  stretched  across  the 
street,  and  a  great  murmur  of  voices  broke  the  silence 
of  the  dawn. 

Sam's  heart  beat  so  that  he  was  hard  put  to  it  to  keep 
back  the  tears  from  his  eyes.  He  thought  with  a  gasp 
of  the  days  of  anxiety  that  had  passed  when  the  new 
bugle  had  not  come  from  the  Chicago  company,  and  in 
retrospect  he  suffered  again  the  horror  of  the  days  of 
waiting.  It  had  been  all  important.  He  could  not 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  31 

his  father  for  raving  and  shouting  about  the  house,  he 
himself  had  felt  like  raving,  and  had  put  another  dollar 
of  his  savings  into  telegrams  before  the  treasure  was 
finally  in  his  hands.  Now,  the  thought  that  it  might  not 
have  come  sickened  him,  and  a  little  prayer  of  thankful 
ness  rose  from  his  lips.  To  be  sure  one  might  have 
been  secured  from  a  nearby  town,  but  not  a  new  shining 
one  to  go  with  his  father's  new  blue  uniform. 

A  cheer  broke  from  the  crowd  massed  along  the 
street.  Into  the  street  rode  a  tall  figure  seated  upon  a 
white  horse.  The  horse  was  from  Culvert's  livery  and 
the  boys  there  had  woven  ribbons  into  its  mane  and  tail. 
Windy  McPherson,  sitting  very  straight  in  the  saddle  and 
looking  wonderfully  striking  in  the  new  blue  uniform 
and  the  broad-brimmed  campaign  hat,  had  the  air  of  a 
conqueror  come  to  receive  the  homage  of  the  town.  He 
wore  a  gold  band  across  his  chest  and  against  his  hip 
rested  the  shining  bugle.  With  stern  eyes  he  looked 
down  upon  the  people. 

The  lump  in  the  throat  of  the  boy  hurt  more  and  more. 
A  great  wave  of  pride  ran  over  him,  submerging  him. 
In  a  moment  he  forgot  all  the  past  humiliations  the  father 
had  brought  upon  his  family,  and  understood  why  his 
mother  remained  silent  when  he,  in  his  blindness,  had 
wanted  to  protest  against  her  seeming  indifference. 
Glancing  furtively  up  he  saw  a  tear  lying  upon  her  cheek 
and  felt  that  he  too  would  like  to  sob  aloud  his  pride 
and  happiness. 

Slowly  and  with  stately  stride  the  horse  walked  up 
the  street  between  the  rows  of  silent  waiting  people.  In 
front  of  the  town  hall  the  tall  military  figure,  rising  in 
the  saddle,  took  one  haughty  look  at  the  multitude,  and 
then,  putting  the  bugle  to  his  lips,  blew. 

Out  of  the  bugle  came  only  a  thin  piercing  shriek  fol 
lowed  by  a  squawk.  Again  Windy  put  the  bugle  to  his 
lips  and  again  the  same  dismal  squawk  was  his  only  re- 


32  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

ward.  On  his  face  was  a  look  of  helpless  boyish  aston 
ishment. 

And  in  a  moment  the  people  knew.  It  was  only  an 
other  of  Windy  McPherson's  pretensions.  He  couldn't 
blow  a  bugle  at  all 

A  great  shout  of  laughter  rolled  down  the  street.  Men 
and  women  sat  on  the  curbstones  and  laughed  until  they 
were  tired.  Then,  looking  at  the  figure  upon  the  mo 
tionless  horse,  they  laughed  again. 

Windy  looked  about  him  with  troubled  eyes.  It  is 
doubtful  if  he  had  ever  had  a  bugle  to  his  lips  until  that 
moment,  but  he  was  filled  with  wonder  and  astonish 
ment  that  the  reveille  did  not  roll  forth.  He  had  heard 
the  thing  a  thousand  times  and  had  it  clearly  in  his  mind ; 
with  all  his  heart  he  wanted  it  to  roll  forth,  and  could 
picture  the  street  ringing  with  it  and  the  applause  of  the 
people;  the  thing,  he  felt,  was  in  him,  and  it  was  only 
a  fatal  blunder  in  nature  that  it  did  not  come  out  at  the 
flaring  end  of  the  bugle.  He  was  amazed  at  this  dismal 
end  of  his  great  moment — he  was  always  amazed  and 
helpless  before  facts. 

The  crowd  began  gathering  about  the  motionless,  as 
tonished  figure,  laughter  continuing  to  send  them  off  into 
something  near  convulsions.  Grasping  the  bridle  of  the 
horse,  John  Telfer  began  leading  it  off  up  the  street. 
Boys  whooped  and  shouted  at  the  rider,  "Blow !  Blow !" 

The  three  McPhersons  stood  in  a  doorway  leading  into 
a  shoe  store.  The  boy  and  the  mother,  white  and  speech 
less  with  humiliation,  dared  not  look  at  each  other.  In 
the  flood  of  shame  sweeping  over  them  they  stared 
straight  before  them  with  hard,  stony  eyes. 

The  procession  led  by  John  Telfer  at  the  bridle  of  the 
white  horse  marched  down  the  street.  Looking  up,  the 
eyes  of  the  laughing  shouting  man  met  those  of  the 
boy  and  a  look  of  pain  shot  across  his  face.  Dropping 
the  bridle  he  hurried  away  through  the  crowd.  The  pro- 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  33 

cession  moved  on,  and  watching  their  chance  the  mother 
and  the  two  children  crept  home  along  side  streets, 
Kate  weeping  bitterly.  Leaving  them  at  the  door  Sam 
went  straight  on  down  a  sandy  road  toward  a  small  wood. 
' '  I've  got  my  lesson.  I've  got  my  lesson,"  he  muttered 
over  and  over  as  he  went. 

At  the  edge  of  the  wood  he  stopped  and  leaning  on 
a  rail  fence  watched  until  he  saw  his  mother  come  out 
to  the  pump  in  the  back  yard.  She  had  begun  to  draw 
water  for  the  day's  washing.  For  her  also  the  holiday 
was  at  an  end.  A  flood  of  tears  ran  down  the  boy's 
cheeks,  and  he  shook  his  fist  in  the  direction  of  the  town. 
"You  may  laugh  at  that  fool  Windy,  but  you  shall  never 
laugh  at  Sam  McPherson,"  he  cried,  his  voice  shaking 
with  excitement. 


CHAPTER  III 

ONE  evening,  when  he  had  grown  so  that  he  out- 
topped  Windy,  Sam  McPherson  returned  from  his  paper 
route  to  find  his  mother  arrayed  in  her  black,  church- 
going  dress.  An  evangelist  was  at  work  in  Caxton  and 
she  had  decided  to  hear  him.  Sam  shuddered.  In  the 
house  it  was  an  understood  thing  that  when  Jane  Mc 
Pherson  went  to  church  her  son  went  with  her.  There 
was  nothing  said.  Jane  McPherson  did  all  things  with 
out  words,  always  there  was  nothing  said.  Now  she 
stood  waiting  in  her  black  dress  when  her  son  came  in 
at  the  door  and  he  hurriedly  put  on  his  best  clothes  and 
went  with  her  to  the  brick  church. 

Valmore,  John  Telfer,  and  Freedom  Smith,  who  had 
taken  upon  themselves  a  kind  of  common  guardianship 
of  the  boy  and  with  whom  he  spent  evening  after  evening 
at  the  back  of  Wildman's  grocery,  did  not  go  to  church. 
They  talked  of  religion  and  seemed  singularly  curious 
and  interested  in  what  other  men  thought  on  the  sub 
ject  but  they  did  not  allow  themselves  to  be  coaxed  into 
a  house  of  worship.  To  the  boy,  who  had  become  a 
fourth  member  of  the  evening  gatherings  at  the  back 
of  the  grocery  store,  they  would  not  talk  of  God,  an 
swering  the  direct  questions  he  sometimes  asked  by 
changing  the  subject.  Once  Telfer,  the  reader  of  poetry, 
answered  the  boy.  "Sell  papers  and  fill  your  pockets 
with  money  but  let  your  soul  sleep,"  he  said  sharply. 

In  the  absence  of  the  others  Wildman  talked  more 
freely.  He  was  a  spiritualist  and  tried  to  make  Sam  see 
the  beauties  of  that  faith.  On  long  summer  afternoons 

34 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  35 

the  grocer  and  the  boy  spent  hours  driving  through  the 
streets  in  a  rattling  old  delivery  wagon,  the  man  striving 
earnestly  to  make  clear  to  the  boy  the  shadowy  ideas  of 
God  that  were  in  his  mind. 

Although  Windy  McPherson  had  been  the  leader  of 
a  bible  class  in  his  youth,  and  had  been  a  moving  spirit 
at  revival  meetings  during  his  early  days  in  Caxton,  he 
no  longer  went  to  church  and  his  wife  did  not  ask  him 
to  go.  On  Sunday  mornings  he  lay  abed.  If  there 
was  work  to  be  done  about  the  house  or  yard  he  com 
plained  of  his  wounds.  He  complained  of  his  wounds 
when  the  rent  fell  due,  and  when  there  was  a  shortage 
of  food  in  the  house.  Later  in  his  life  and  after  the 
death  of  Jane  McPherson  the  old  soldier  married  the 
widow  of  a  farmer  by  whom  he  had  four  children  and 
with  whom  he  went  to  church  twice  on  Sunday.  Kate 
wrote  Sam  one  of  her  infrequent  letters  about  it.  "He 
has  met  his  match,"  she  said,  and  was  tremendously 
pleased. 

In  church  on  Sunday  mornings  Sam  went  regularly  to 
sleep,  putting  his  head  on  his  mother's  arm  andjsleeping 
throughout  the  service.  Jane  McPherson  loved  to  have 
the  boy  there  beside  her.  It  was  the  one  thing  in  life 
they  did  together  and  she  did  not  mind  his  sleeping  the 
time  away.  Knowing  how  late  he  had  been  upon  the 
streets  at  the  paper  selling  on  Saturday  evenings,  she 
looked  at  him  with  eyes  filled  with  tenderness  and  sym 
pathy.  Once  the  minister,  a  man  with  brown  beard  and 
hard,  tightly-closed  mouth,  spoke  to  her.  "Can't  you 
keep  him  awake?"  he  asked  impatiently.  "He  needs  the 
sleep,"  she  said  and  hurried  past  the  minister  and  out 
of  the  church,  looking  ahead  of  her  and  frowning. 

The  evening  of  the  evangelist  meeting  was  a  summer 
evening  fallen  on  a  winter  month.  All  day  the  warm 
winds, had  come  up  from  the  southwest.  Mud  lay  soft 
and  deep  in  the  streets  and  among  the  little  pools  of  water 


36  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

on  the  sidewalks  were  dry  spots  from  which  steam  arose. 
Nature  had  forgotten  herself.  A  day  that  should  have 
sent  old  fellows  to  their  nests  behind  stoves  in  stores 
sent  them  forth  to  loaf  in  the  sun.  The  night  fell  warm 
and  cloudy.  A  thunder  storm  threatened  in  the  month 
of  February. 

Sam  walked  along  the  sidewalk  with  his  mother  bound 
for  the  brick  church,  wearing  a  new  grey  overcoat. 
The  night  did  not  demand  the  overcoat  but  Sam  wore 
it  out  of  an  excess  of  pride  in  its  possession.  The  over 
coat  had  an  air.  It  had  been  made  by  Gunther  the  tailor 
after  a  design  sketched  on  the  back  of  a  piece  of  wrapping 
paper  by  John  Telfer  and  had  been  paid  for  out  of  the 
newsboy's  savings.  The  little  German  tailor,  after  a  talk 
with  Valmore  and  Telfer,  had  made  it  at  a  marvellously 
low  price.  Sam  swaggered  as  he  walked. 

He  did  not  sleep  in  church  that  evening;  indeed  he 
found  the  quiet  church  filled  with  a  medley  of  strange 
noises.  Folding  carefully  the  new  coat  and  laying  it 
beside  him  on  the  seat  he  looked  with  interest  at  the 
people,  feeling  within  him  something  of  the  nervous  ex 
citement  with  which  the  air  was  charged.  The  evangelist, 
a  short,  athletic-looking  man  in  a  grey  business  suit, 
seemed  to  the  boy  out  of  place  in  the  church.  He  had  the 
assured  business-like  air  of  the  travelling  men  who  came 
to  the  New  Leland  House,  and  Sam  thought  he  looked 
like  a  man  who  had  goods  to  be  sold.  He  did  not  stand 
quietly  back  of  the  pulpit  giving  out  the  text  as  did  the 
brown-bearded  minister,  nor  did  he  sit  with  closed  eyes 
and  clasped  hands  waiting  for  the  choir  to  finish  singing. 
While  the  choir  sang  he  ran  up  and  down  the  platform 
waving  his  arms  and  shouting  excitedly  to  the  people  on 
the  church  benches,  "Sing!  Sing!  Sing!  For  the  glory 
of  God,  sing!" 

When  the  song  was  finished,  he  began  talking,  quietly 
at  first,  of  life  in  the  town.  As  he  talked  he  grew 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  37 

more  and  more  excited.  "The  town  is  a  cesspool  of 
vice !"  he  shouted.  "It  reeks  with  evil !  The  devil  counts 
it  a  suburb  of  hell!" 

His  voice  rose,  and  sweat  ran  off  his  face.  A  sort 
of  frenzy  seized  him.  He  pulled  off  his  coat  and  throw 
ing  it  over  a  chair  ran  up  and  down  the  platform  and 
into  the  aisles  among  the  people,  shouting,  threatening, 
pleading.  People  began  to  stir  uneasily  in  their  seats. 
Jane  McPherson  stared  stonily  at  the  back  of  the  woman 
in  front  of  her.  Sam  was  horribly  frightened. 

The  newsboy  of  Caxton  was  not  without  a  hunger  for 
religion.  Like  all  boys  he  thought  much  and  often  of 
death.  In  the  night  he  sometimes  awakened  cold  with 
fear,  thinking  that  death  must  be  just  without  the  door 
of  his  room  waiting  for  him.  When  in  the  winter  he 
had  a  cold  and  coughed,  he  trembled  at  the  thought  of 
tuberculosis.  Once,  when  he  was  taken  with  a  fever,  he 
fell  asleep  and  dreamed  that  he  had  died  and  was  walking 
on  the  trunk  of  a  fallen  tree  over  a  ravine  filled  with 
lost  souls  that  shrieked  with  terror.  When  he  awoke  he 
prayed.  Had  some  one  come  into  his  room  and  heard 
his  prayer  he  would  have  been  ashamed. 

On  winter  evenings  as  he  walked  through  the  dark 
streets  with  the  papers  under  his  arm  he  thought  of  his 
soul.  As  he  thought  a  tenderness  came  over  him ;  a  lump 
came  into  his  throat  and  he  pitied  himself;  he  felt  that 
there  was  something  missing  in  his  life,  something  he 
wanted  very  badly. 

Under  John  Telfer's  influence,  the  boy,  who  had  quit 
school  to  devote  himself  to  money  making,  read  Walt 
Whitman  and  had  a  season  of  admiring  his  own  body 
with  its  straight  white  legs,  and  the  head  that  was  poised 
so  jauntily  on  the  body.  Sometimes  he  would  awaken  on 
summer  nights  and  be  so  filled  with  strange  longing 
that  he  would  creep  out  of  bed  and,  pushing  open  the 
window,  sit  upon  the  floor,  his  bare  legs  sticking  out 


38  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

beyond  his  white  nightgown,  and,  thus  sitting,  yearn 
eagerly  toward  some  fine  impulse,  some  call,  some  sense 
of  bigness  and  of  leadership  that  was  absent  from  the 
necessities  of  the  life  he  led.  He  looked  at  the  stars  and 
listened  to  the  night  noises,  so  filled  with  longing  that 
the  tears  sprang  to  his  eyes. 

Once,  after  the  affair  of  the  bugle,  Jane  McPherson  had 
been  ill — and  the  first  touch  of  the  finger  of  death  reach 
ing  out  to  her — had  sat  with  her  son  in  the  warm  dark 
ness  in  the  little  grass  plot  at  the  front  of  the  house.  It 
was  a  clear,  warm,  star-lit  evening  without  a  moon,  and 
as  the  two  sat  closely  together  a  sense  of  the  coming  of 
death  crept  over  the  mother. 

At  the  evening  meal  Windy  McPherson  had  talked 
voluminously,  ranting  and  shouting  about  the  house.  He 
said  that  a  housepainter  who  had  a  real  sense  of  colour 
had  no  business  trying  to  work  in  a  hole  like  Caxton. 
He  had  been  in  trouble  with  a  housewife  about  a  colour 
he  had  mixed  for  painting  a  porch  floor  and  at  his  own 
table  he  raved  about  the  woman  and  what  he  declared 
her  lack  of  even  a  primitive  sense  of  colour.  "I  am  sick 
of  it  all,"  he  shouted,  going  out  of  the  house  and  up 
the  street  with  uncertain  steps.  His  wife  had  been  un 
moved  by  his  outburst,  but  in  the  presence  of  the  quiet 
boy  whose  chair  touched  her  own  she  trembled  with  a 
strange  new  fear  and  began  to  talk  of  the  life  after  death, 
making  effort  after  effort  to  get  at  what  she  wanted  to 
say,  and  only  succeeding  in  rinding  expression  for  her 
thoughts  in  little  sentences  broken  by  long  painful  pauses. 
She  told  the  boy  she  had  no  doubt  at  all  that  there  was 
some  kind  of  future  life  and  that  she  believed  she  should 
see  and  live  with  him  again  after  they  had  finished  with 
this  world. 

One  day  the  minister  who  had  been  annoyed  because 
he  had  slept  in  his  church,  stopped  Sam  on  the  street  to 
talk  to  him  of  his  soul.  He  said  that  the  boy  should  be 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  39 

thinking  of  making  himself  one  of  the  brothers  in  Christ 
by  joining  the  church.  Sam  listened  silently  to  the  talk 
of  the  man,  whom  he  instinctively  disliked,  but  in  his 
silence  felt  there  was  something  insincere.  With  all  his 
heart  he  wanted  to  repeat  a  sentence  he  had  heard  from 
the  lips  of  grey-haired,  big-fisted  Valmore — "How  can 
they  believe  and  not  lead  a  life  of  simple,  fervent  devo 
tion  to  their  belief?'*  He  thought  himself  superior  to  the 
thin-lipped  man  who  talked  with  him  and  had  he  been 
able  to  express  what  was  in  his  heart  he  might  have  said, 
"Look  here,  man!  I  am  made  of  different  stuff  from 
all  the  people  there  at  the  church.  I  am  new  clay  to  be 
moulded  into  a  new  man.  Not  even  my  mother  is  like 
me.  I  do  not  accept  your  ideas  of  life  just  because  you 
say  they  are  good  any  more  than  I  accept  Windy  Mc- 
Pherson  just  because  he  happens  to  be  my  father." 

During  one  winter  Sam  spent  evening  after  evening 
reading  the  Bible  in  his  room.  It  was  after  Kate's  mar 
riage — she  had  got  into  an  affair  with  a  young  farmer 
that  had  kept  her  name  upon  the  tongues  of  whisperers 
for  months  but  was  now  a  housewife  on  a  farm  at  the 
edge  of  a  village  some  miles  from  Caxton,  and  the  mother 
was  again  at  her  endless  task  among  the  soiled  clothes 
in  the  kitchen  and  Windy  McPherson  off  drinking  and 
boasting  about  town.  Sam  read  the  book  in  secret.  He 
had  a  lamp  on  a  little  stand  beside  his  bed  and  a  novel, 
lent  him  by  John  Telfer,  beside  it.  When  his  mother 
came  up  the  stairway  he  slipped  the  Bible  under  the 
cover  of  the  bed  and  became  absorbed  in  the  novel.  He 
thought  it  something  not  quite  in  keeping  with  his  aims 
as  a  business  man  and  a  money  getter  to  be  concerned 
about  his  soul.  He  wanted  to  conceal  his  concern  but 
with  all  his  heart  wanted  to  get  hold  of  the  message 
of  the  strange  book,  about  which  men  wrangled  hour 
after  hour  on  winter  evenings  in  the  store. 

He  did  not  get  it ;  and  after  a  time  he  stopped  reading 


40  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

the  book.  Left  to  himself  he  might  have  sensed  its 
meaning,  but  on  all  sides  of  him  were  the  voices  of  the 
men — the  men  at  Wildman's  who  owned  to  no  faith  and 
yet  were  filled  with  dogmatisms  as  they  talked  behind  the 
stove  in  the  grocery ;  the  brown-bearded,  thin-lipped  min 
ister  in  the  brick  church;  the  shouting,  pleading  evan 
gelists  who  came  to  visit  the  town  in  the  winter;  the 
gentle  old  grocer  who  talked  vaguely  of  the  spirit  world, 
— all  these  voices  were  at  the  mind  of  the  boy  pleading, 
insisting,  demanding,  not  that  Christ's  simple  message 
that  men  love  one  another  to  the  end,  that  they  work 
together  for  the  common  good,  be  accepted,  but  that 
their  own  complex  interpretation  of  his  word  be  taken 
to  the  end  that  souls  be  saved. 

In  the  end  the  boy  of  Caxton  got  to  the  place  where 
he  had  a  dread  of  the  word  soul.  It  seemed  to  him  that 
the  mention  of  the  word  in  conversation  was  something 
shameful  and  to  think  of  the  word  or  the  shadowy  some 
thing  for  which  the  word  stood  an  act  of  cowardice.  In 
his  mind  the  soul  became  a  thing  to  be  hidden  away,  cov 
ered  up,  not  thought  of.  One  might  be  allowed  to  speak 
of  the  matter  at  the  moment  of  death,  but  for  the  healthy 
man  or  boy  to  have  the  thought  of  his  soul  in  his  mind 
or  word  of  it  on  his  lips — one  might  better  become  bla 
tantly  profane  and  go  to  the  devil  with  a  swagger. 
With  delight  he  imagined  himself  as  dying  and  with 
his  last  breath  tossing  a  round  oath  into  the  air  of  his 
death  chamber. 

In  the  meantime  Sam  continued  to  have  inexplicable 
longings  and  hopes.  He  kept  surprising  himself  by  the 
changing  aspect  of  his  own  viewpoint  of  life.  He  found 
himself  indulging  in  the  most  petty  meannesses,  and  fol 
lowing  these  with  flashes  of  a  kind  of  loftiness  of  mind. 
Looking  at  a  girl  passing  in  the  street,  he  had  unbe 
lievably  mean  thoughts;  and  the  next  day,  passing  the 
same  girl,  a  line  caught  from  the  babbling  of  John  Telfer 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  41 

came  to  his  lips  and  he  went  his  way  muttering,  "June's 
twice  June  since  she  breathed  it  with  me." 

And  then  into  the  complex  nature  of  this  boy  came 
the  sex  motive.  Already  he  dreamed  of  having  women 
in  his  arms.  He  looked  shyly  at  the  ankles  of  women 
crossing  the  street,  and  listened  eagerly  when  the  crowd 
about  the  stove  in  Wildmari's  f  ell  to  telling  smutty  stories. 
He  sank  to  unbelievable  depths  of  triviality  in  sordidness, 
looking  shyly  into  dictionaries  for  words  that  appealed 
to  the  animal  lust  in  his  queerly  perverted  mind  and, 
when  he  came  across  it,  lost  entirely  the  beauty  of  the 
old  Bible  tale  of  Ruth  in  the  suggestion  of  intimacy  be 
tween  man  and  woman  that  it  brought  to  him.  And  yet 
Sam  McPherson  was  no  evil-minded  boy.  He  had,  as 
a  matter  of  fact,  a  quality  of  intellectual  honesty  that 
appealed  strongly  to  the  clean-minded  simple-hearted  old 
blacksmith  Valmore;  he  had  awakened  something  like 
love  in  the  hearts  of  the  women  school  teachers  in  the 
Caxton  schools,  at  least  one  of  whom  continued  to  interest 
herself  in  him,  taking  him  with  her  on  walks  along  coun 
try  roads,  and  talking  to  him  constantly  of  the  develop 
ment  of  his  mind ;  and  he  was  the  friend  and  boon  com 
panion  of  Telfer,  the  dandy,  the  reader  of  poems,  the 
keen  lover  of  life.  The  boy  was  struggling  to  find  him 
self.  One  night  when  the  sex  call  kept  him  awake  he  got 
up  and  dressed,  and  went  and  stood  in  the  rain  by  the 
creek  in  Miller's  pasture.  The  wind  swept  the  rain 
across  the  face  of  the  water  and  a  sentence  flashed 
through  his  mind:  "The  little  feet  of  the  rain  run  on 
the  water."  There  was  a  quality  of  almost  lyrical  beauty 
in  the  Iowa  boy. 

And  this  boy,  who  couldn't  get  hold  of  his  impulse 
toward  God,  whose  sex  impulses  made  him  at  times  mean, 
at  times  full  of  beauty,  and  who  had  decided  that  the 
impulse  toward  bargaining  and  money  getting  was  the 
impulse  in  him  most  worth  cherishing,  now  sat  beside 


42  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

his  mother  in  church  and  watched  with  wide-open  eyes 
the  man  who  took  off  his  coat,  who  sweated  profusely, 
and  who  called  the  town  in  which  he  lived  a  cesspool  of 
vice  and  its  citizens  wards  of  the  devil. 

The  evangelist  from  talking  of  the  town  began  talking 
instead  of  heaven  and  hell  and  his  earnestness  caught 
the  attention  of  the  listing  boy  who  began  seeing  pic 
tures. 

Into  his  mind  there  came  a  picture  of  a  burning  pit 
of  fire  in  which  great  flames  leaped  about  the  heads  of 
the  people  who  writhed  in  the  pit.  "Art  Sherman  would 
be  there,"  thought  Sam,  materialising  the  picture  he  saw; 
"nothing  can  save  him;  he  keeps  a  saloon." 

Filled  with  pity  for  the  man  he  saw  in  the  picture  of 
the  burning  pit,  his  mind  centered  on  the  person  of  Art 
Sherman.  He  liked  Art  Sherman.  More  than  once  he 
had  felt  the  touch  of  human  kindness  in  the  man.  The 
roaring,  blustering  saloonkeeper  had  helped  the  boy  sell 
and  collect  for  newspapers.  "Pay  the  kid  or  get  out  of 
the  place,"  the  red-faced  man  roared  at  drunken  men 
leaning  on  the  bar. 

And  then,  looking  into  the  burning  pit,  Sam  thought 
of  Mike  McCarthy,  for  whom  he  had  at  that  moment  a 
kind  of  passion  akin  to  a  young  girl's  blind  devotion  to 
her  lover.  With  a  shudder  he  realised  that  Mike  also 
would  go  into  the  pit,  for  he  had  heard  Mike  laughing 
at  churches  and  declaring  there  was  no  God. 

The  evangelist  ran  upon  the  platform  and  called  to 
the  people  demanding  that  they  stand  upon  their  feet. 
"Stand  up  for  Jesus,"  he  shouted;  "stand  up  and  be 
counted  among  the  host  of  the  Lord  God." 

In  the  church  people  began  getting  to  their  feet.  Jane 
.McPherson  stood  with  the  others.  Sam  did  not  stand. 
He  crept  behind  his  mother's  dress,  hoping  to  pass 
through  the  storm  unnoticed.  The  call  to  the  faithful  to 
stand  was  a  thing  to  be  complied  with  or  resisted  as  the 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  43 

people  might  wish;  it  was  something  entirely  outside  of 
himself.  It  did  not  occur  to  him  to  count  himself  among 
either  the  lost  or  the  saved. 

Again  the  choir  began  singing  and  a  businesslike  move 
ment  began  among  the  people.  Men  and  women  went  up 
and  down  the  aisles  clasping  the  hands  of  people  in  the 
pews,  talking  and  praying  aloud.  "Welcome  among  us," 
they  said  to  certain  ones  who  stood  upon  their  feet.  "It 
gladdens  our  hearts  to  see  you  among  us.  We  are  happy 
at  seeing  you  in  the  fold  among  the  saved.  It  is  good  to 
confess  Jesus/' 

Suddenly  a  voice  from  the  bench  back  of  him  struck 
terror  to  Sam's  heart.  Jim  Williams,  who  worked  in 
Sawyer's  barber  shop,  was  upon  his  knees  and  in  a  loud 
voice  was  praying  for  the  soul  of  Sam  McPherson. 
"Lord,  help  this  erring  boy  who  goes  up  and  down  in  the 
company  of  sinners  and  publicans,"  he  shouted. 

In  a  moment  the  terror  of  death  and  the  fiery  pit  that 
had  possessed  him  passed,  and  Sam  was  filled  instead 
with  blind,  dumb  rage.  He  remembered  that  this  same 
Jim  Williams  had  treated  lightly  the  honour  of  his  sister 
at  the  time  of  her  disappearance,  and  he  wanted  to  get 
upon  his  feet  and  pour  out  his  wrath  on  the  head  of 
the  man,  who,  he  felt,  had  betrayed  him.  "They  would 
not  have  seen  me/'  he  thought ;  "this  is  a  fine  trick  Jim 
Williams  has  played  me.  I  shall  be  even  with  him  for 
this." 

He  got  to  his  feet  and  stood  beside  his  mother.  He 
had  no  qualms  about  passing  himself  off  as  one  of  the 
lambs  safely  within  the  fold.  His  mind  was  bent  upon 
quieting  Jim  Williams'  prayers  and  avoiding  the  atten 
tion  of  the  people. 

The  minister  began  calling  on  the  standing  people  to 
testify  of  their  salvation.  From  various  parts  of  the 
church  the  people  spoke  out,  some  loudly  and  boldly 
and  with  a  ring  of  confidence  in  their  voices,  some  trem- 


44  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

blingly  and  hesitatingly.  One  woman  wept  loudly  shout 
ing  between  the  paroxysms  of  sobbing  that  seized  her, 
"The  weight  of  my  sins  is  heavy  on  my  soul."  Girls 
and  young  men  when  called  on  by  the  minister  responded 
with  shamed,  hesitating  voices  asking  that  a  verse  of 
some  hymn  be  sung,  or  quoting  a  line  of  scripture. 

At  the  back  of  the  church  the  evangelist  with  one  of 
the  deacons  and  two  or  three  women  had  gathered  about 
a  small,  black-haired  woman,  the  wife  of  a  baker  to  whom 
Sam  delivered  papers.  They  were  urging  her  to  rise 
and  get  within  the  fold,  and  Sam  turned  and  watched 
her  curiously,  his  sympathy  going  out  to  her.  With  all 
his  heart  he  hoped  that  she  would  continue  doggedly 
shaking  her  head. 

Suddenly  the  irrepressible  Jim  Williams  broke  forth 
again.  A  quiver  ran  over  Sam's  body  and  the  blood  rose 
to  his  cheeks.  ."Here  is  another  sinner  saved/'  shouted 
Jim,  pointing  to  the  standing  boy.  "Count  this  boy, 
Sam  McPherson,  in  the  fold  among  the  lambs." 

On  the  platform  the  brown-bearded  minister  stood 
upon  a  chair  and  looked  over  the  heads  of  the  people. 
An  ingratiating  smile  played  about  his  lips.  "Let  us 
hear  from  the  young  man,  Sam  McPherson,"  he  said, 
raising  his  hand  for  silence,  and,  then,  encouragingly, 
"Sam,  what  have  you  to  say  for  the  Lord?" 

Become  the  centre  for  the  attention  of  the  people  in 
the  church  Sam  was  terror-stricken.  The  rage  against 
Jim  Williams  was  forgotten  in  the  spasm  of  fear  that 
seized  him.  He  looked  over  his  shoulder  to  the  door  at 
the  back  of  the  church  and  thought  longingly  of  the 
quiet  street  outside.  He  hesitated,  stammered,  grew  more 
red  and  uncertain,  and  finally  burst  out:  "The  Lord," 
he  said,  and  then  looked  about  hopelessly,  "the  Lord 
maketh  me  to  lie  out  in  green  pastures." 

In  the  seats  behind  him  a  titter  arose.  A  young  woman 
sitting  among  the  singers  in  the  choir  put  her  handker- 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  45 

chief  to  her  face  and  throwing  back  her  head  rocked 
back  and  forth.  A  man  near  the  door  guffawed  loudly 
and  went  hurriedly  out.  All  over  the  church  people  be 
gan  laughing. 

Sam  turned  his  eyes  upon  his  mother.  She  was  staring 
straight  ahead  of  her,  and  her  face  was  red.  "I'm  going 
out  of  this  place  and  I'm  never  coming  back  again,"  he 
whispered,  and,  stepping  into  the  aisle,  walked  boldly 
toward  the  door.  He  had  made  up  his  mind  that  if  the 
evangelist  tried  to  stop  him  he  would  fight.  At  his  back 
he  felt  the  rows  of  people  looking  at  him  and  smiling. 
The  laughter  continued. 

In  the  street  he  hurried  along  consumed  with  indigna 
tion.  "I'll  never  go  into  any  church  again,"  he  swore, 
shaking  his  fist  in  the  air.  The  public  avowals  he  had 
heard  in  the  church  seemed  to  him  cheap  and  unworthy. 
He  wondered  why  his  mother  stayed  in  there.  With  a 
sweep  of  his  arm  he  dismissed  all  the  people  in  the 
church.  "It  is  a  place  to  make  public  asses  of  the  peo 
ple,"  he  thought. 

Sam  McPherson  wandered  through  Main  Street,  dread 
ing  to  meet  Valmore  and  John  Telfer.  Finding  the 
chairs  back  of  the  stove  in  Wildman's  grocery  deserted, 
he  hurried  past  the  grocer  and  hid  in  a  corner.  Tears 
of  wrath  stood  in  his  eyes.  He  had  been  made  a  fool 
of.  He  imagined  the  scene  that  would  go  on  when  he 
came  upon  the  street  with  the  papers  the  next  morning. 
Freedom  Smith  would  be  there  sitting  in  the  old  worn 
buggy  and  roaring  so  that  all  the  street  would  listen  and 
laugh.  "Going  to  lie  out  in  any  green  pastures  to-night, 
Sam?"  he  would  shout  "Ain't  you  afraid  you'll  take 
cold?"  By  Geiger's  drug  store  would  stand  Valmore  and 
Telfer,  eager  to  join  in  the  fun  at  his  expense.  Telfer 
would  pound  on  the  side  of  the  building  with  his  cane 
and  roar  with  laughter.  Valmore  would  make  a  trumpet 
of  his  hands  and  shout  after  the  fleeing  boy.  "Do  you 


46  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

sleep  out  alone  in  them  green  pastures?"  Freedom  Smith 
would  roar  again. 

Sam  got  up  and  went  out  of  the  grocery.  As  he  hur 
ried  along,  blind  with  wrath,  he  felt  he  would  like  a 
stand-up  fight  with  some  one.  And,  then,  hurrying  and 
avoiding  the  people,  he  merged  with  the  crowd  on  the 
street  and  became  a  witness  to  the  strange  thing  that 
happened  that  night  in  Caxton. 

In  Main  Street  hushed  people  stood  about  in  groups 
talking.  The  air  was  heavy  with  excitement.  Solitary 
figures  went  from  group  to  group  whispering  hoarsely. 
Mike  McCarthy,  the  man  who  had  denied  God  and  who 
had  won  a  place  for  himself  in  the  affection  of  the  news 
boy,  had  assaulted  a  man  with  a  pocket  knife  and  had 
left  him  bleeding  and  wounded  beside  a  country  road. 
Something  big  and  sensational  had  happened  in  the  life 
of  the  town. 

Mike  McCarthy  and  Sam  were  friends.  For  years 
the  man  had  idled  upon  the  streets  of  the  town,  loitering 
about,  boasting  and  talking.  He  had  sat  for  hours  in 
a  chair  under  a  tree  before  the  New  Leland  House,  read 
ing  books,  doing  tricks  with  cards,  engaging  in  long  dis 
cussions  with  John  Telfer  or  any  who  would  stand  up 
to  him. 

Mike  McCarthy  got  into  trouble  in  a  fight  over  a 
woman.  A  young  farmer  living  at  the  edge  of  Caxton 
had  come  home  from  the  fields  to  find  his  wife  in  the 
bold  Irishman's  arms  and  the  two  men  had  gone  out  of 
the  house  together  to  fight  in  the  road.  The  woman, 
weeping  in  the  house,  followed  to  ask  forgiveness  of  her 
husband.  Running  in  the  gathering  darkness  along  the 
road  she  had  found  him  cut  and  bleeding  terribly,  lying  in 
a  ditch  under  a  hedge.  On  down  the  road  she  ran  and 
appeared  at  the  door  of  a  neighbour,  screaming  and  call 
ing  for  help. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  47 

The  story  of  the  fight  in  the  road  got  to  Caxton  just 
as  Sam  came  out  of  the  corner,  back  of  the  stove  in 
Wildman's  and  appeared  on  the  street.  Men  ran  from 
store  to  store  and  from  group  to  group  along  the  street 
saying  that  the  young  farmer  had  died  and  that  murder 
had  been  done.  On  a  street  corner  Windy  McPherson 
harangued  the  crowd  declaring  that  the  men  of  Caxton 
should  arise  in  the  defence  of  their  homes  and  string 
the  murderer  to  a  lamp  post.  Hop  Higgins,  driving  a 
horse  from  Culvert's  livery,  appeared  on  Main  Street. 
"He  will  be  at  the  McCarthy  farm,"  he  shouted.  When 
several  men,  coming  out  of  Geiger's  drug  store,  stopped 
the  marshal's  horse,  saying,  "You  will  have  trouble  out 
there;  you  had  better  take  help,"  the  little  red- faced 
marshal  with  the  crippled  leg  laughed.  "What  trouble  ?" 
he  asked— "To  get  Mike  McCarthy?  I  shall  ask  him 
to  come  and  he  will  come.  The  rest  of  that  lot  won't 
cut  any  figure.  Mike  can  wrap  the  entire  McCarthy 
family  around  his  finger." 

There  were  six  of  the  McCarthy  men,  all,  except  Mike, 
silent,  sullen  men  who  only  talked  when  they  were  in 
liquor.  Mike  furnished  the  town's  social  touch  with  the 
family.  It  was  a  strange  family  to  live  there  in  that 
fat,  corn-growing  country,  a  family  with  something 
savage  and  primitive  about  it,  one  that  belonged  among 
western  mining  camps  or  among  the  half  savage  dwellers 
in  deep  alleys  in  cities,  and  the  fact  that  it  lived  on  a 
corn  farm  in  Iowa  was,  in  the  words  of  John  Telfer, 
"something  monstrous  in  Nature." 

The  McCarthy  farm,  lying  some  four  miles  east  of 
Caxton,  had  once  contained  a  thousand  acres  of  good 
corn-growing  land.  Lem  McCarthy,  the  father  of  the 
family,  had  inherited  it  from  a  brother,  a  gold  miner, 
a  forty-niner,  a  sport  owning  fast  horses,  who  planned 
to  breed  race  horses  on  the  Iowa  land.  Lem  had  come 
out  of  the  back  streets  of  an  eastern  city,  bringing  his 


48  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

brood  of  tall,  silent,  savage  boys  to  live  upon  the  land  and, 
like  the  forty-niner,  to  be  a  sport.  Thinking  the  wealth 
that  had  come  to  him  vast  beyond  spending,  he  had 
plunged  into  horse  racing  and  gambling.  When,  within 
two  years,  five  hundred  acres  of  the  farm  had  to  be  sold 
to  pay  gambling  debts,  and  the  wide  acres  lay  covered 
with  weeds,  Lem  became  alarmed,  and  settled  down  to 
hard  work,  the  boys  working  all  day  in  the  field  and  at 
long  intervals  coming  into  town  at  night  to  get  into 
trouble.  Having  no  mother  or  sister,  and  knowing  that 
no  Caxton  woman  could  be  hired  to  go  upon  the  place, 
they  did  their  own  housework;  and  on  rainy  days  sat 
about  the  old  farmhouse  playing  cards  and  fighting.  On 
other  days  they  would  stand  around  the  bar  in  Art  Sher 
man's  saloon  in  Piety  Hollow  drinking  until  they  had  lost 
their  savage  silence  and  had  become  loud  and  quarrel 
some,  going  from  there  upon  the  streets  to  seek  trouble. 
Once,  going  into  Hayner's  restaurant,  they  took  stacks 
of  plates  from  shelves  back  of  the  counter  and,  standing 
in  the  doorway,  threw  them  at  people  passing  in  the 
street,  the  crash  of  the  breaking  crockery  accompanying 
their  roaring  laughter.  When  they  had  driven  the  people 
to  cover  they  got  upon  their  horses  and  with  wild  shouts 
raced  up  and  down  Main  Street  between  the  rows  of 
tied  horses  until  Hop  Higgins,  the  town  marshal,  ap 
peared,  when  they  rode  off  into  the  country  awakening 
the  farmers  along  the  darkened  road  as  they  fled,  shout 
ing  and  singing,  toward  home. 

When  the  McCarthy  boys  got  into  trouble  in  Caxton, 
old  Lem  McCarthy  drove  into  town  and  got  them  out  of 
it,  paying  for  the  damage  done  and  going  about  declar 
ing  the  boys  meant  no  harm.  When  told  to  keep  them 
out  of  town  he  shook  his  head  and  said  he  would  try. 

Mike  McCarthy  did  not  ride  swearing  and  singing  with 
the  five  brothers  along  the  dark  road.  He  did  not  work 
all  day  in  the  hot  corn  fields.  He  was  the  family  gentle- 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  49 

man,  and,  wearing  good  clothes,  strolled  instead  upon 
the  street  or  loitered  in  the  shade  before  the  New  Leland 
House.  Mike  had  been  educated.  For  some  years  he  had 
attended  a  college  in  Indiana  from  which  he  was  expelled 
for  an  affair  with  a  woman.  After  his  return  from 
college  he  stayed  in  Caxton,  living  at  the  hotel  and  mak 
ing  a  pretence  of  studying  law  in  the  office  of  old  Judge 
Reynolds.  He  paid  slight  attention  to  the  study  of  law, 
but  with  infinite  patience  had  so  trained  his  hands  that 
he  became  wonderfully  dexterous  with  coins  and  cards, 
plucking  them  out  of  the  air  and  making  them  appear 
in  the  shoes,  the  hats,  and  even  in  the  mouths,  of  by 
standers.  During  the  day  he  walked  the  streets  looking 
at  the  girl  clerks  in  the  stores,  or  stood  upon  the  station 
platform  waving  his  hand  to  women  passengers  on  pass 
ing  trains.  He  told  John  Telfer  that  the  flattery  of 
women  was  a  lost  art  that  he  intended  to  restore.  Mike 
McCarthy  carried  in  his  pockets  books  which  he  read 
sitting  in  a  chair  before  the  hotel  or  on  the  stones  before 
store  windows.  When  on  Saturdays  the  streets  were 
filled  with  people,  he  stood  on  the  corners  giving 
gratuitous  performances  of  his  magical  art  with  cards 
and  coins,  and  eyeing  country  girls  in  the  crowd.  Once, 
a  woman,  the  town  stationer's  wife,  shouted  at  him  call 
ing  him  a  lazy  lout,  whereupon  he  threw  a  coin  in  the  air, 
and  when  it  did  not  come  down  rushed  toward  her. shout 
ing,  "She  has  it  in  her  stocking."  When  the  stationer's 
wife  ran  into  her  shop  and  banged  the  door  the  crowd 
laughed  and  shouted  with  delight. 

Telfer  had  a  liking  for  the  tall,  grey-eyed,  loitering 
McCarthy  and  sometimes  sat  with  him  discussing  a  novel 
or  a  poem;  Sam  in  the  background  listened  eagerly. 
Valmore  did  not  care  for  the  man,  shaking  his  head  and 
declaring  that  such  a  fellow  could  come  to  no  good  end. 

The  rest  of  the  town  agreed  with  Valmore,  and  Mc 
Carthy,  knowing  this,  sunned  himself  in  the  town's  dis- 


50  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

pleasure.  For  the  sake  of  the  public  furor  it  brought 
down  upon  his  head  he  proclaimed  himself  a  socialist,  an 
anarchist,  an  atheist,  a  pagan.  Among  all  the  McCarthy 
boys  he  alone  cared  greatly  about  women,  and  he  made 
public  and  open  declarations  of  his  passion  for  them.  Be 
fore  the  men  gathered  about  the  stove  in  Wildman's 
grocery  store  he  would  stand  whipping  them  into  a  frenzy 
by  declaring  for  free  love,  and  vowing  that  he  would 
have  the  best  of  any  woman  who  gave  him  the  chance. 

For  this  man  the  frugal,  hard  working  newsboy  had 
conceived  a  regard  amounting  to  a  passion.  As  he 
listened  to  McCarthy  he  got  continuous  delightful  little 
thrills.  "There  is  nothing  he  would  not  dare/'  thought 
the  boy.  "He  is  the  freest,  the  boldest,  the  bravest  man 
in  town."  When  the  young  Irishman,  seeing  the  admira 
tion  in  his  eyes,  flung  him  a  silver  dollar  saying,  "That 
is  for  your  fine  brown  eyes,  my  boy;  if  I  had  them  I 
would  have  half  the  women  in  town  after  me,"  Sam 
kept  the  dollar  in  his  pocket  and  counted  it  a  kind  of 
treasure  like  the  rose  given  a  lover  by  his  sweetheart. 

It  was  past  eleven  o'clock  when  Hop  Higgins  returned 
to  town  with  McCarthy,  driving  quietly  along  the  street 
and  through  an  alley  at  the  back  of  the  town  hall.  The 
crowd  upon  the  street  had  broken  up.  Sam  had  gone 
from  one  to  another  of  the  muttering  groups,  his  heart 
quaking  with  fear.  Now  he  stood  at  the  back  of  the 
mass  of  men  gathered  at  the  jail  door.  An  oil  lamp, 
burning  at  the  top  of  the  post  above  the  door,  threw 
dancing,  flickering  lights  on  the  faces  of  the  men  before 
him.*  The  thunder  storm  that  had  threatened  had  not 
come,  but  the  unnatural  warm  wind  continued  and  the 
sky  overhead  was  inky  black. 

Through  the  alley,  to  the  jail  door,  drove  the  town 
marshal,  the  young  McCarthy  sitting  in  the  buggy  be 
side  him.  A  man  rushed  forward  to  hold  the  horse. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  51 

McCarthy's  face  was  chalky  white.  He  laughed  and 
shouted,  raising  his  hand  toward  the  sky. 

"I  am  Michael,  son  of  God.  I  have  cut  a  man  with 
a  knife  so  that  his  red  blood  ran  upon  the  ground.  I 
am  the  son  of  God  and  this  filthy  jail  shall  be  my  sanctu 
ary.  In  there  I  shall  talk  aloud  with  my  Father/'  he 
roared  hoarsely,  shaking  his  fist  at  the  crowd.  "Sons  of 
this  cesspool  of  respectability,  stay  and  hear!  Send  for 
your  females  and  let  them  stand  in  the  presence  of  a 
man!" 

Taking  the  white,  wild-eyed  man  by  the  arm  Marshal 
Higgins  led  him  into  the  jail,  the  clank  of  locks,  the 
low  murmur  of  the  voice  of  Higgins  and  the  wild  laugh 
ter  of  McCarthy  floating  out  to  the  group  of  silent  men 
standing  in  the  mud  of  the  alley. 

Sam  McPherson  ran  past  the  group  of  men  to  the  side 
of  the  jail  and  rinding  John  Telfer  and  Valmore  leaning 
silently  against  the  wall  of  Tom  Folger's  wagon  shop 
slipped  between  them.  Telfer  put  out  his  arm  and  laid 
it  upon  the  boy's  shoulder.  Hop  Higgins,  coming  out  of 
the  jail,  addressed  the  crowd.  "Don't  answer  if  he  talks," 
he  said ;  "he  is  as  crazy  as  a  loon." 

Sam  moved  closer  to  Telfer.  The  voice  of  the  im 
prisoned  man,  loud,  and  filled  with  a  startling  boldness, 
rolled  out  of  the  jail.  He  began  praying. 

"Hear  me,  Father  Almighty,  who  has  permitted  this 
town  of  Caxton  to  exist  and  has  let  me,  Thy  son,  grow 
to  manhood.  I  am  Michael,  Thy  son.  They  have  put 
me  in  this  jail  where  rats  run  across  the  floor  and  they 
stand  in  the  mud  outside  as  I  talk  with  Thee.  Are  you 
there,  old  Truepenny?" 

A  breath  of  cold  air  blew  up  the  alley  followed  by  a 
flaw  of  rain.  The  group  under  the  flickering  lamp  by 
the  jail  entrance  drew  back  against  the  walls  of  the  build 
ing.  Sam  could  see  them  dimly,  pressing  closely  against 
the  wall.  The  man  in  the  jail  laughed  loudly. 


52  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

"I  have  had  a  philosophy  of  life,  O  Father,"  he 
shouted.  "I  have  seen  men  and  women  here  living  year 
after  year  without  children.  I  have  seen  them  hoarding 
pennies  and  denying  Thee  new  life  on  which  to  work 
Thy  will.  To  these  women  I  have  gone  secretly  talking 
of  carnal  love.  With  them  I  have  been  gentle  and  kind; 
them  I  have  flattered." 

A  roaring  laugh  broke  from  the  lips  of  the  imprisoned 
man.  "Are  you  there,  oh  dwellers  in  the  cesspool  of 
respectability?'*  he  shouted.  "Do  you  stand  in  the  mud 
with  cold  feet  listening?  I  have  been  with  your  wives. 
Eleven  Caxton  wives  without  babes  have  I  been  with 
and  it  has  been  fruitless.  The  twelfth  woman  I  have 
just  left,  leaving  her  man  in  the  road  a  bleeding  sacri 
fice  to  thee.  I  shall  call  out  the  names  of  the  eleven.  I 
shall  have  revenge  also  upon  the  husbands  of  the  women, 
some  of  whom  wait  with  the  others  in  the  mud  out 
side." 

He  began  calling  off  the  names  of  Caxton  wives.  A 
shudder  ran  through  the  body  of  the  boy,  sensitised  by 
the  new  chill  in  the  air  and  by  the  excitement  of  the 
night.  Among  the  men  standing  along  the  wall  of  the 
jail  a  murmur  arose.  Again  they  grouped  themselves 
under  the  flickering  light  by  the  jail  door,  disregarding 
the  rain.  Valmore,  stumbling  out  of  the  darkness  be 
side  Sam,  stood  before  Telfer.  "The  boy  should  be 
going  home,"  he  said;  "this  isn't  fit  for  him  to 
hear." 

Telfer  laughed  and  drew  Sam  closer  to  him.  "He 
has  heard  enough  lies  in  this  town,"  he  said.  "Truth 
won't  hurt  him.  I  would  not  go  myself,  nor  would  you, 
and  the  boy  shall  not  go.  This  McCarthy  has  a  brain. 
Although  he  is  half  insane  now  he  is  trying  to  work  some 
thing  out.  The  boy  and  I  will  stay  to  hear." 

The  voice  from  the  jail  continued  calling  out  the 
names  of  Caxton  wives.  Voices  in  the  group  before  the 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  53' 

jail  door  began  shouting :  "This  should  be  stopped.  Let 
us  tear  down  the  jail." 

McCarthy  laughed  aloud.  "They  squirm,  oh  Father, 
they  squirm ;  I  have  them  in  the  pit  and  I  torture  them," 
he  cried. 

An  ugly  feeling  of  satisfaction  came  over  Sam.  He 
had  a  sense  of  the  fact  that  the  names  shouted  from  the 
jail  would  be  repeated  over  and  over  through  the  town. 
One  of  the  women  whose  names  had  been  called  out  had 
stood  with  the  evangelist  at  the  back  of  the  church  trying 
to  induce  the  wife  of  the  baker  to  rise  and  be  counted  in 
the  fold  with  the  lambs. 

The  rain,  falling  on  the  shoulders  of  the  men  by  the 
jail  door,  changed  to  hail,  the  air  grew  colder  and  the 
hailstones  rattled  on  the  roofs  of  buildings.  Some  of 
the  men  joined  Telfer  and  Valmore,  talking  in  low,  ex 
cited  voices.  "And  Mary  McKane,  too,  the  hypocrite," 
Sam  heard  one  of  them  say. 

The  voice  inside  the  jail  changed.  Still  praying,  Mike 
McCarthy  seemed  also  to  be  talking  to  the  group  in  the 
darkness  outside. 

"I  am  sick  of  my  life.  I  have  sought  leadership  and 
have  not  found  it.  Oh  Father!  Send  down  to  men  a 
new  Christ,  one  to  get  hold  of  us,  a  modern  Christ  with 
a  pipe  in  his  mouth  who  will  swear  and  knock  us  about 
so  that  we  vermin  who  pretend  to  be  made  in  Thy  image 
will  understand.  Let  him  go  into  churches  and  into  court 
houses,  into  cities,  and  into  towns  like  this,  shouting,  'Be 
ashamed!  Be  ashamed  of  your  cowardly  concern  over 
your  snivelling  souls !'  Let  him  tell  us  that  never  will  our 
lives,  so  miserably  lived,  be  repeated  after  our  bodies  lie 
rotting  in  the  grave." 

A  sob  broke  from  his  lips  and  a  lump  came  into  Sam's 
throat. 

"Oh  Father !  help  us  men  of  Caxton  to  understand  that 
we  have  only  this,  our  lives,  this  life  so  warm  and  hope- 


'54  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

ful  and  laughing  in  the  sun,  this  life  with  its  awkward 
boys  full  of  strange  possibilities,  and  its  girls  with  their 
long  legs  and  freckles  on  their  noses,  that  are  meant  to 
carry  life  within  themselves,  new  life,  kicking  and  stir 
ring,  and  waking  them  at  night." 

The  voice  of  the  prayer  broke.  Wild  sobs  took  the 
place  of  speech.  "Father !"  shouted  the  broken  voice,  "I 
have  taken  a  life,  a  man  that  moved  and  talked  and 
whistled  in  the  sunshine  on  winter  mornings;  I  have 
killed." 

The  voice  inside  the  jail  became  inaudible.  Silence, 
broken  by  low  sobs  from  the  jail,  fell  on  the  little  dark 
alley  and  the  listening  men  began  going  silently  away. 
The  lump  in  Sam's  throat  grew  larger.  Tears  stood  in 
his  eyes.  He  went  with  Telfer  and  Valmore  out  of  the 
alley  and  into  the  street,  the  two  men  walking  in  silence. 
The  rain  had  ceased  and  a  cold  wind  blew. 

The  boy  felt  that  he  had  been  shriven.  His  mind,  his 
heart,  even  his  tired  body  seemed  strangely  cleansed.  He 
felt  a  new  affection  for  Telfer  and  Valmore.  When 
Telfer  began  talking  he  listened  eagerly,  thinking  that  ats 
last  he  understood  him  and  knew  why  men  like  Val 
more,  Wildman,  Freedom  Smith,  and  Telfer,  loved  each 
other  and  went  on  being  friends  year  after  year  in  the 
face  of  difficulties  and  misunderstandings.  He  thought 
that  he  had  got  hold  of  the  idea  of  brotherhood  that 
John  Telfer  talked  of  so  often  and  so  eloquently.  "Mike 
McCarthy  is  only  a  brother  who  has  gone  the  dark  road," 
he  thought  and  felt  a  glow  of  pride  in  the  thought  and 
in  the  apt  expression  of  it  in  his  mind. 

John  Telfer,  forgetting  the  boy,  talked  soberly  to  Val 
more,  the  two  men  stumbling  along  in  the  darkness  in 
tent  upon  their  own  thoughts. 

"It  is  an  odd  thought,"  said  Telfer  and  his  voice  seemed 
far  away  and  unnatural  like  the  voice  from  the  jail ;  "it 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  55 

is  an  odd  thought  that  but  for  a  quirk  in  the  brain  this 
Mike  McCarthy  might  himself  have  been  a  kind  of  Christ 
with  a  pipe  in  his  mouth." 

Valmore  stumbled  and  half  fell  in  the  darkness  at  a 
street  crossing.  Telfer  went  on  talking. 

"The  world  will  some  day  grope  its  way  into  some 
kind  of  an  understanding  of  its  extraordinary  men.  Now 
they  suffer  terribly.  In  success  or  in  such  failures  as 
has  come  to  this  imaginative,  strangely  perverted  Irish 
man  their  lot  is  pitiful.  It  is  only  the  common,  the  plain, 
unthinking  man  who  slides  peacefully  through  this  trou 
bled  world." 

At  the  house  Jane  McPherson  sat  waiting  for  her  boy. 
She  was  thinking  of  the  scene  in  the  church  and  a  hard 
light  was  in  her  eyes.  Sam  went  past  the  sleeping  room 
of  his  parents,  where  Windy  McPherson  snored  peace 
fully,  and  up  the  stairway  to  his  own  room.  He  un 
dressed  and,  putting  out  the  light,  knelt  upon  the  floor. 
From  the  wild  ravings  of  the  man  in  the  jail  he  had  got 
hold  of  something.  In  the  midst  of  the  blasphemy  of 
Mike  McCarthy  he  had  sensed  a  deep  and  abiding  love 
of  life.  Where  the  church  had  failed  the  bold  sensualist 
succeeded.  Sam  felt  that  he  could  have  prayed  in  the 
presence  of  the  entire  town. 

"Oh,  Father!"  he  cried,  sending  up  his  voice  in  the 
silence  of  the  little  room,  "make  me  stick  to  the  thought 
that  the  right  living  of  this,  my  life,  is  my  duty  to 
you." 

By  the  door  below,  while  Valmore  waited  on  the  side 
walk,  Telfer  talked  to  Jane  McPherson. 

"I  wanted  Sam  to  hear,"  he  explained.  "He  needs  a 
religion.  All  young  men  need  a  religion.  I  wanted  him 
to  hear  how  even  a  man  like  Mike  McCarthy  keeps  in 
stinctively  trying  to  justify  himself  before  God." 


CHAPTER   IV 

JOHN  TELFER'S  friendship  was  a  formative  influence 
upon  Sam  McPherson.  His  father's  worthlessness  and 
the  growing  realisation  of  the  hardship  of  his  mother's 
position  had  given  life  a  bitter  taste  in  his  mouth,  and 
Telfer  sweetened  it.  He  entered  with  zeal  into  Sam's 
thoughts  and  dreams,  and  tried  valiantly  to  arouse  in  the 
quiet,  industrious,  money-making  boy  some  of  his  own 
love  of  life  and  beauty,  At  night,  as  the  two  walked 
down  country  roads,  the  man  would  stop  and,  waving  his 
arms  about,  quote  Poe  or  Browning  or,  in  another  mood, 
would  compel  Sam's  attention  to  the  rare  smell  of  a 
hayfield  or  to  a  moonlit  stretch  of  meadow. 

Before  people  gathered  on  the  streets  he  teased  the  boy, 
calling  him  a  little  money  grubber  and  saying,  "He  is 
like  a  little  mole  that  works  underground.  As  the  mole 
goes  for  a  worm  so  this  boy  goes  for  a  five-cent  piece. 
I  have  watched  him.  A  travelling  man  goes  out  of  town 
leaving  a  stray  dime  or  nickel  here  and  within  an  hour 
it  is  in  this  boy's  pocket.  I  have  talked  to  banker  Wal 
ker  of  him.  He  trembles  lest  his  vaults  become  too  small 
to  hold  the  wealth  of  this  young  Croesus.  The  day  will 
come  when  he  will  buy  the  town  and  put  it  into  his 
vest  pocket." 

For  all  his  public  teasing  of  the  boy  Telfer  had  the 
genius  to  adopt  a  different  attitude  when  they  were  alone 
together.  Then  he  talked  to  him  openly  and  freely  as 
he  talked  to  Valmore  and  Freedom  Smith  and  to  other 
cronies  of  his  on  the  streets  of  Caxton.  Walking  along 
the  road  he  would  point  with  his  cane  to  the  town  and 

56 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  57 

say,  "You  and  that  mother  of  yours  have  more  of  the 
real  stuff  in  you  than  the  rest  of  the  boys  and  mothers 
of  the  town  put  together." 

In  all  Caxton  Telfer  was  the  only  man  who  knew 
books  and  who  took  them  seriously.  Sam  sometimes 
found  his  attitude  toward  them  puzzling  and  would  stand 
with  open  mouth  listening  as  Telfer  swore  or  laughed 
at  a  book  as  he  did  at  Valmore  or  Freedom  Smith.  He 
had  a  fine  portrait  of  Browning  which  he  kept  hung  in 
the  stable  and  before  this  he  would  stand,  his  legs  spread 
apart,  and  his  head  tilted  to  one  side,  talking. 

"A  rich  old  sport  you  are,  eh?"  he  would  say,  grin 
ning.  "Getting  yourself  discussed  by  women  and  col 
lege  professors  in  clubs,  eh?  You  old  fraud !" 

Toward  Mary  Underwood,  the  school  teacher  who  had 
become  Sam's  friend  and  with  whom  the  boy  sometimes 
walked  and  talked,  Telfer  had  no  charity.  Mary  Under 
wood  was  a  sort  of  cinder  in  the  eyes  of  Caxton.  She 
was  the  only  child  of  Silas  Underwood,  the  town  har 
ness  maker,  who  once  had  worked  in  a  shop  belonging 
to  Windy  McPherson.  After  the  business  failure  of 
Windy  he  had  started  independently  and  for  a  time  did 
well,  sending  his  daughter  to  a  school  in  Massachusetts. 
Mary  did  not  understand  the  people  of  Caxton  and  the 
people  misunderstood  and  distrusted  her.  Taking  no 
part  in  the  life  of  the  town  and  keeping  to  herself  and 
to  her  books  she  awoke  a  kind  of  fear  in  others.  Because 
she  did  not  join  them  at  church  suppers,  or  go  from  porch 
to  porch  gossiping  with  other  women  through  the  long 
summer  evenings,  they  thought  her  something  abnormal. 
On  Sundays  she  sat  alone  in  her  pew  at  church  and  on 
Saturday  afternoons,  come  storm,  come  sunshine,  she 
walked  on  country  roads  and  through  the  woods  ac 
companied  by  a  Collie  dog.  She  was  a  small  woman 
with  a  straight,  slender  figure  and  had  fine  blue  eyes 
filled  with  changing  lights,  hidden  by  the  eye-glasses  she 


5»  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

almost  constantly  wore.  Her  lips  were  very  full  and 
red,  and  she  sat  with  them  parted  so  that  the  edges  of 
her  fine  teeth  showed.  Her  nose  was  large,  and  a  fine 
reddish-brown  colour  glowed  in  her  cheeks.  _  Though 
different,  she  had,  like  Jane  McPherson,  a  habit  of  si 
lence;  and  under  her  silence,  she,  like  Sam's  mother, 
possessed  an  unusually  strong  vigorous  mind. 

As  a  child  she  was  a  sort  of  half  invalid  and  had 
not  been  on  friendly  footing  with  other  children.  It  was 
then  that  her  habit  of  silence  and  reticence  had  been 
established.  The  years  in  the  school  in  Massachusetts 
restored  her  health  but  did  not  break  this  habit.  She 
came  home  and  took  the  place  in  the  schools  to  earn 
money  with  which  to  take  her  back  East,  dreaming  of  a 
position  as  instructor  in  an  eastern  college.  She  was 
that  rare  thing,  a  woman  scholar,  loving  scholarship  for 
its  own  sake. 

Mary  Underwood's  position  in  the  town  and  in  the 
schools  was  insecure.  Out  of  her  silent,  independent  way 
of  life  had  sprung  a  misunderstanding  that,  at  least  once, 
had  taken  definite  form  and  had  come  near  driving  her 
from  the  town  and  schools.  That  she  did  not  succumb  to 
the  storm  of  criticism  that  for  some  weeks  beat  about  her 
head  was  due  to  her  habit  of  silence  and  to  a  determina 
tion  to  get  her  own  way  in  the  face  of  everything. 

It  was  a  suggestion  of  scandal  that  had  put  the  grey 
hairs  upon  her  head.  The  scandal  had  blown  over  before 
the  time  of  her  friendship  for  Sam,  but  he  had  known 
of  it.  In  those  days  he  knew  of  everything  that  went  on 
in  the  town — his  quick  ears  and  eyes  missed  nothing. 
More  than  once  he  had  heard  the  men  waiting  to  be 
shaved  in  Sawyer's  barber  shop  speak  of  her. 

The  tale  ran  that  she  had  been  involved  in  an  affair 
with  a  real  estate  agent  who  had  afterward  left  town. 
It  was  said  that  the  man,  a  tall,  fine-looking  fellow,  had 
been  in  love  with  Mary  and  had  wanted  to  desert  his 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  59 

wife  and  go  away  with  her.  One  night  he  had  driven 
to  Mary's  house  in  a  closed  buggy  and  the  two  had  driven 
into  the  country.  They  had  sat  for  hours  in  the  covered 
buggy  at  the  side  of  the  road  and  talked,  and  people  driv 
ing  past  had  seen  them  there  talking  together. 

And  then  she  had  got  out  of  the  buggy  and  walked 
home  alone  through  snow  drifts.  The  next  day  she  was 
at  school  as  usual.  When  told  of  it  the  school  superin 
tendent,  a  puttering  old  fellow  with  vacant  eyes,  had 
shaken  his  head  in  alarm  and  declared  that  it  must  be 
looked  into.  He  called  Mary  into  his  little  narrow  office 
in  the  school  building,  but  lost  courage  when  she  sat  be 
fore  him,  and  said  nothing.  The  man  in  the  barber  shop, 
who  repeated  the  tale,  said  that  the  real  estate  man  drove 
on  to  a  distant  station  and  took  a  train  to  the  city,  and 
that  some  days  later  he  came  back  to  Caxton  and  moved 
his  family  out  of  town. 

Sam  dismissed  the  story  from  his  mind.  Having  be 
gun  a  friendship  for  Mary  he  put  the  man  in  the  barber 
shop  into  a  class  with  Windy  McPherson  and  thought 
of  him  as  a  pretender  and  liar  who  talked  for  the  sake  of 
talk.  He  remembered  with  a  shock  the  crude  levity  with 
which  the  loafers  in  the  shop  had  greeted  the  repetition 
of  the  tale.  Their  comments  had  come  back  to  his  mind 
as  he  walked  through  the  streets  with  his  newspapers  and 
had  given  him  a  kind  of  jolt.  He  went  along  under  the 
trees  thinking  of  the  sunlight  falling  upon  the  grey  hair 
as  they  walked  together  on  summer  afternoons,  and  bit 
his  lip  and  opened  and  closed  his  fist  convulsively. 

During  Mar.y's  second  year  in  the  Caxton  schools  her 
mother  died,  and  at  the  end  of  another  year,  her  father, 
failing  in  the  harness  business,  Mary  became  a  fixture  in 
the  schools.  The  house  at  the  edge  of  the  town,  the  prop 
erty  of  her  mother,  had  come  down  to  her  and  she  lived 
there  with  an  old  aunt.  After  the  passing  of  the  wind 
of  scandal  concerning  the  real  estate  man  the  town  lost 


60  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

interest  in  her.  She  was  thirty-six  at  the  time  of  her 
first  f  riedship  with  Sam  and  lived  alone  among  her  books. 

Sam  had  been  deeply  moved  by  her  friendship.  It 
had  seemed  to  him  something  significant  that  grown 
people  with  affairs  of  their  own  should  be  so  in  earnest 
about  his  future  as  she  and  Telfer  were.  Boylike,  he 
counted  it  a  tribute  to  himself  rather  than  to  the  win 
some  youth  in  him,  and  was  made  proud  by  it.  Hav 
ing  no  real  feeling  for  books,  and  only  pretending  to 
have  out  of  a  desire  to  please,  he  sometimes  went  from 
one  to  the  other  of  his  two  friends,  passing  off.  their 
opinions  as  his  own. 

At  this  trick  Telfer  invariably  caught  him.  "That  is 
not  your  notion/'  he  would  shout,  "you  have  it  from  that 
school  teacher.  It  is  the  opinion  of  a  woman.  Their 
opinions,  like  the  books  they  sometimes  write,  are  found 
ed  on  nothing.  They  are  not  the  real  things.  Women 
know  nothing.  Men  only  care  for  them  because  they 
have  not  had  what  they  want  from  them.  No  woman  is 
really  big — except  maybe  my  woman,  Eleanor." 

When  Sam  continued  to  be  much  in  the  company  of 
Mary,  Telfer  grew  more  bitter. 

"I  would  have  you  observe  women's  minds  and  avoid 
letting  them  influence  your  own,"  he  told  the  boy.  "They 
live  in  a  world  of  unrealities.  They  like  even  vulgar 
people  in  books,  but  shrink  from  the  simple,  earthly  folk 
about  them.  That  school  teacher  is  so.  Is  she  like  me? 
Does  she,  while  loving  books,  love  also  the  very  smell  of 
human  life?" 

In  a  way  Telfer's  attitude  toward  the  kindly  little 
school  teacher  became  Sam's  attitude.  Although  they 
walked  and  talked  together  the  course  of  study  she  had 
planned  for  him  he  never  took  up  and  as  he  grew  to  know 
her  better,  the  books  she  read  and  the  ideas  she  advanced 
appealed  to  him  less  and  less.  He  thought  that  she,  as 
Telfer  held,  lived  in  a  world  of  illusion  and  unreality 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  61 

and  said  so.  When  she  lent  him  books,  he  put  them  in 
his  pocket  and  did  not  read  them.  When  he  did  read, 
he  thought  the  books  reminded  him  of  something  that 
hurt  him.  They  were  in  some  way  false  and  pretentious. 
He  thought  they  were  like  his  father.  One  day  he  tried 
reading  aloud  to  Telfer  from  a  book  Mary  Underwood 
had  lent  him. 

The  story  was  one  of  a  poetic  man  with  long,  unclean 
fingernails  who  went  among  people  preaching  the  doc 
trine  of  beauty.  It  began  with  a  scene  on  a  hillside  in 
a  rainstorm  where  the  poetic  man  sat  under  a  tent  writ 
ing  a  letter  to  his  sweetheart. 

Telfer  was  beside  himself.  Jumping  from  his  seat 
under  a  tree  by  the  roadside  he  waved  his  arms  and 
shouted : 

"Stop !  Stop  it !  Do  not  go  on  with  it.  The  story  lies. 
A  man  could  not  write  love  letters  under  the  circum 
stances  and  he  was  a  fool  to  pitch  his  tent  on  a  hillside. 
A  man  in  a  tent  on  a  hillside  in  a  storm  would  be  cold 
and  wet  and  getting  the  rheumatism.  To  be  writing 
letters  he  would  need  to  be  an  unspeakable  ass.  He  had 
better  be  out  digging  a  trench  to  keep  the  water  from 
running  through  his  tent." 

Waving  his  arms,  Telfer  went  off  up  the  road  and 
Sam  followed  thinking  him  altogether  right,  and,  if  later 
in  life  he  learned  that  there  are  men  who  could  write  love 
letters  on  a  piece  of  housetop  in  a  flood,  he  did  not  know 
it  then  and  the  least  suggestion  of  windiness  or  pretence 
lay  heavy  in  his  stomach. 

Telfer  had  a  vast  enthusiasm  for  Bellamy's  "Looking 
Backward,"  and  read  it  aloud  to  his  wife  on  Sunday 
afternoons,  sitting  under  the  apple  trees  in  the  garden. 
They  had  a  fund  of  little  personal  jokes  and  sayings  that 
they  were  forever  laughing  over,  and  she  had  infinite 
delight  in  his  comments  on  the  life  and  people  of  Caxton, 
but  did  not  share  his  love  of  books.  When  she  some- 


62  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

times  went  to  sleep  in  her  chair  during  the  Sunday 
afternoon  readings  he  poked  her  with  his  cane  and  laugh 
ingly  told  her  to  wake  up  and  listen  to  the  dream  of  a 
great  dreamer.  Among  Browning's  verses  his  favourites 
were  "A  Light  Woman"  and  "Fra  Lippo  Lippi,"  and  he 
would  recite  these  aloud  with  great  gusto.  He  de 
clared  Mark  Twain  the  greatest  man  in  the  world  and  in 
certain  moods  he  would  walk  the  road  beside  Sam  recit 
ing  over  and  over  one  or  two  lines  of  verse,  often  this 
from  Poe : 

Helen,  thy  beauty  is  to  me 
Like  some  Nicean  bark  of  yore. 

Then,  stopping  and  turning  upon  the  boy,  he  would  de 
mand  whether  or  not  the  writing  of  such  lines  wasn't 
worth  living  a  life  for. 

Telfer  had  a  pack  of  dogs  that  always  went  with  them 
on  their  walks  at  night  and  he  had  for  them  long  Latin 
names  that  Sam  could  never  remember.  One  summer 
he  bought  a  trotting  mare  from  Lem  McCarthy  and  gave 
great  attention  to  the  colt,  which  he  named  Bellamy  Boy, 
trotting  him  up  and  down  a  little  driveway  by  the  side  of 
his  house  for  hours  at  a  time  and  declaring  he  would 
be  a  great  trotting  horse.  He  could  recite  the  colt's 
pedigree  with  great  gusto  and  when  he  had  been  talking 
to  Sam  of  some  book  he  would  repay  the  boy's  atten 
tion  by  saying,  "You,  my  boy,  are  as  far  superior  to  the 
run  of  boys  about  town  as  the  colt,  Bellamy  Boy,  is  supe 
rior  to  the  farm  horses  that  are  hitched  along  Main  Street 
on  Saturday  afternoons."  And  then,  with  a  wave  of 
his  hand  and  a  look  of  much  seriousness  on  his  face, 
he  would  add,  ''And  for  the  same  reason.  You  have 
been,  like  him,  under  a  master  trainer  of  youth." 

One  evening  Sam,  now  grown  to  man's  stature  and 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  63 

full  of  the  awkwardness  and  self -consciousness  of  his 
new  growth,  was  sitting  on  a  cracker  barrel  at  the  back 
of  Wildman's  grocery.  It  was  a  summer  evening  and 
a  breeze  blew  through  the  open  doors  swaying  the  hang 
ing  oil  lamps  that  burned  and  sputtered  overhead.  As 
usual  he  was  listening  in  silence  to  the  talk  that  went  on 
among  the  men. 

Standing  with  legs  wide  apart  and  from  time  to  time 
jabbing  with  his  cane  at  Sam's  legs,  John  Telfer  held 
forth  on  the  subject  of  love. 

"It  is  a  theme  that  poets  do  well  to  write  of/'  he  de 
clared.  "In  writing  of  it  they  avoid  the  necessity  of  em 
bracing  it.  In  trying  for  a  well-turned  line  they  forget 
to  look  at  well-turned  ankles.  He  who  sings  most  pas 
sionately  of  love  has  been  in  love  the  least ;  he  wooes  the 
goddess  of  poesy  and  only  gets  into  trouble  when  he,  like 
John  Keats,  turns  to  the  daughter  of  a  villager  and  tries 
to  live  the  lines  he  has  written." 

"Stuff  and  nonsense,"  roared  Freedom  Smith,  who  had 
been  sitting  tilted  far  back  in  a  chair  with  his  feet  against 
the  cold  stove,  smoking  a  short,  black  pipe,  and  who  now 
brought  his  feet  down  upon  the  floor  with  a  bang.  Ad 
miring  Telfer's  flow  of  words  he  pretended  to  be  filled 
with  scorn.  "The  night  is  too  hot  for  eloquence,"  he 
bellowed.  "If  you  must  be  eloquent  talk  of  ice  cream 
or  mint  juleps  or  recite  a  verse  about  the  old  swimming 
pool." 

Telfer,  wetting  his  finger,  thrust  it  into  the  air. 

"The  wind  is  in  the  north-west ;  the  beasts  roar ;  we  will 
have  a  storm,"  he  said,  winking  at  Valmore. 

Banker  Walker  came  into  the  store,  followed  by  his 
daughter.  She  was  a  small,  dark-skinned  girl  with  black, 
quick  eyes.  Seeing  Sam  sitting  with  swinging  legs  upon 
the  cracker  barrel  she  spoke  to  her  father  and  went  out 
of  the  store.  At  the  sidewalk  she  stopped  and,  turning, 
made  a  quick  motion  with  her  hand. 


64  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

Sam  jumped  off  the  cracker  barrel  and  strolled  toward 
the  street  door.  A  flush  was  on  his  cheeks.  His  mouth 
felt  hot  and  dry.  He  went  with  extreme  deliberateness, 
stopping  to  bow  to  the  banker,  and  for  a  moment  linger 
ing  to  read  a  newspaper  that  lay  upon  the  cigar  case,  to 
avoid  the  comments  he  feared  his  going  might  excite 
among  the  men  by  the  stove.  In  his  heart  he  trembled 
lest  the  girl  should  have  disappeared  down  the  street, 
and  with  his  eyes,  he  looked  guiltily  at  the  banker, 
who  had  joined  the  group  at  the  back  of  the  store  and 
who  now  stood  listening  to  the  talk,  while  he  read  from 
a  list  held  in  his  hand  and  Wildman  went  here  and  there 
doing  up  packages  and  repeating  aloud  the  names  of  ar 
ticles  called  off  by  the  banker. 

At  the  end  of  the  lighted  business  section  of  Main 
Street,  Sam  found  the  girl  waiting  for  him.  She  began 
to  tell  of  the  subterfuge  by  which  she  had  escaped  her 
father. 

"I  told  him  I  would  go  home  with  my  sister,"  she  said, 
tossing  her  head. 

Taking  hold  of  the  boy's  hand,  she  led  him  along  the 
shaded  street.  For  the  first  time  Sam  walked  in  the 
company  of  one  of  the  strange  beings  that  had  begun 
to  bring  him  uneasy  nights,  and  overcome  with  the  won 
der  of  it  the  blood  climbed  through  his  body  and  made 
his  head  reel  so  that  he  walked  in  silence  unable  to  un 
derstand  his  own  emotions.  He  felt  the  soft  hand  of 
the  girl  with  delight ;  his  heart  pounded  against  the  walls 
of  his  chest  and  a  choking  sensation  gripped  at  his  throat. 

Walking  along  the  street,  past  lighted  residences  where 
the  low  voices  of  women  in  talk  greeted  his  ears,  Sam 
was  inordinately  proud.  He  thought  that  he  should  like 
to  turn  and  walk  with  this  girl  through  the  lighted  Main 
Street.  Had  she  not  chosen  him  from  among  all  the  boys 
of  the  town;  had  she  not,  with  a  flutter  of  her  little, 
white  hand,  called  to  him  with  a  call  that  he  wondered 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  65 

the  men  upon  the  cracker  barrels  had  not  heard?  Her 
boldness  and  his  own  took  his  breath  away.  He  could 
not  talk.  His  tongue  seemed  paralysed. 

Down  the  street  went  the  boy  and  girl,  loitering  in  the 
shadows,  hurrying  past  the  dim  oil  lamps  at  street  cross 
ings,  getting  from  each  other  wave  after  wave  of  exqui 
site  little  thrills.  Neither  spoke.  They  were  beyond 
words.  Had  they  not  together  done  this  daring  thing? 

In  the  shadow  of  a  tree  they  stopped  and  stood  facing 
each  other;  the  girl  looked  at  the  ground  and  stood 
facing  the  boy.  Putting  out  his  hand  he  laid  it  upon  her 
shoulder.  In  the  darkness  on  the  other  side  of  the  street 
a  man  stumbled  homeward  along  a  board  sidewalk.  The 
lights  of  Main  Street  glowed  in  the  distance.  Sam  drew 
the  girl  toward  him.  She  raised  her  head.  Their  lips 
met,  and  then,  throwing  her  arms  about  his  neck,  she 
kissed  him  again  and  again  eagerly. 

Sam's  return  to  Wildman's  was  marked  by  extreme 
caution.  Although  he  had  been  absent  but  fifteen  min 
utes  it  seemed  to  him  that  hours  must  have  passed  and 
he  would  not  have  been  surprised  to  see  the  stores  locked 
and  darkness  settled  down  on  Main  Street.  It  was  in 
conceivable  that  the  grocer  could  still  be  wrapping  pack 
ages  for  banker  Walker.  Worlds  had  been  remade. 
Manhood  had  come  to  him.  Why !  the  man  should  have 
wrapped  the  entire  store,  package  after  package,  and  sent 
it  to  the  ends  of  the  earth.  He  lingered  in  the  shadows 
at  the  first  of  the  store  lights  where  ages  before  he  had 
gone,  a  mere  boy,  to  meet  her,  a  mere  girl,  and  looked 
with  wonder  at  the  lighted  way  before  him. 

Sam  crossed  the  street  and,  from  the  front  of  Sawyer's 
barber  shop,  looked  into  Wildman's.  He  felt  like  a  spy 
looking  into  the  camp  of  an  enemy.  There  before  him 
sat  the  men  into  whose  midst  he  had  it  in  his  power  to 
cast  a  thunderbolt.  He  might  walk  to  the  door  and 


66  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

say,  truthfully  enough,  "Here  before  you  is  a  boy  that 
by  the  flutter  of  a  white  hand  has  been  made  into  a 
man ;  here  is  one  who  has  wrung  the  heart  of  womankind 
and  eaten  his  fill  at  the  tree  of  the  knowledge  of  life/* 

In  the  grocery  the  talk  still  continued  among  the  men 
upon  the  cracker  barrels  who  seemed  unconscious  of  the 
boy's  slinking  entrance.  Indeed,  their  talk  had  sunk. 
From  talking  of  love  and  of  poets  they  talked  of  corn  and 
of  steers.  Banker  Walker,  his  packages  of  groceries 
lying  on  the  counter,  smoked  a  cigar. 

"You  can  fairly  hear  the  corn  growing  to-night/'  he 
said.  "It  wants  but  another  shower  or  two  and  we  shall 
have  a  record  crop.  I  plan  to  feed  a  hundred  steers  at 
my  farm  out  Rabbit  Road  this  winter." 

The  boy  climbed  again  upon  a  cracker  barrel  and  tried 
to  look  unconcerned  and  interested  in  the  talk.  Still  his 
heart  thumped;  still  a  throbbing  went  on  in  his  wrists. 
He  turned  and  looked  at  the  floor  hoping  his  agitation 
would  pass  unnoticed. 

The  banker,  taking  up  the  packages,  walked  out  at 
the  door.  Valmore  and  Freedom  Smith  went  over  to 
the  livery  barn  for  a  game  of  pinochle.  And  John  Tel- 
fer,  twirling  his  cane  and  calling  to  a  troup  of  dogs  that 
loitered  in  an  alley  back  of  the  store,  took  Sam  for  a 
walk  into  the  country. 

"I  will  continue  this  talk  of  love,"  said  Telfer,  strik 
ing  at  weeds  along  the  road  with  his  cane  and  from  time 
to  time  calling  sharply  to  the  dogs  that,  filled  with  de 
light  at  being  abroad,  ran  growling  and  tumbling  over 
each  other  in  the  dusty  road. 

"That  Freedom  Smith  is  a  sample  of  life  in  this  town. 
At  the  word  love  he  drops  his  feet  upon  the  floor  and 
pretends  to  be  filled  with  disgust.  He  will  talk  of  corn 
or  steers  or  of  the  stinking  hides  that  he  buys,  but  at 
the  mention  of  the  word  love  he  is  like  a  hen  that  has 
seen  a  hawk  in  the  sky.  He  runs  about  in  circles  making 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  67 

a  fuss.  'Here !  Here !  Here !'  he  cries,  'you  are  making 
public  something  that  should  be  kept  hidden.  You  are 
doing  in  the  light  of  day  what  should  only  be  done  with 
a  shamed  face  in  a  darkened  room/  Why,  boy,  if  I  were 
a  woman  in  this  town  I  would  not  stand  it — I  would  go 
to  New  York,  to  France,  to  Paris — To  be  wooed  for  but 
a  passing  moment  by  a  shame-faced  yokel  without  art — 
uh — it  is  unthinkable." 

The  man  and  the  boy  walked  in  silence.  The  dogs, 
scenting  a  rabbit,  disappeared  across  a  long  pasture,  their 
master  letting  them  go.  From  time  to  time  he  threw  back 
his  head  and  took  long  breaths  of  the  night  air. 

"I  am  not  like  banker  Walker,"  he  declared.  "He 
thinks  of  the  growing  corn  in  terms  of  fat  steers  feed 
ing  on  the  Rabbit  Run  farm ;  I  think  of  it  as  something 
majestic.  I  see  the  long  corn  rows  with  the  men  and  the 
horses  half  hidden,  hot  and  breathless,  and  I  think  of  a 
vast  river  of  life.  I  catch  a  breath  of  the  flame  that  was 
in  the  mind  of  the  man  who  said,  'The  land  is  flowing 
with  milk  and  honey/  I  am  made  happy  by  my  thoughts 
not  by  the  dollars  clinking  in  my  pocket. 

"And  then  in  the  fall  when  the  corn  stands  shocked 
I  see  another  picture.  Here  and  there  in  companies 
stand  the  armies  of  the  corn.  It  puts  a  ring  in  my  voice 
to  look  at  them.  These  orderly  armies  has  mankind 
brought  out  of  chaos/  I  say  to  myself.  'On  a  smoking 
black  ball  flung  by  the  hand  of  God  out  of  illimitable 
space  has  man  stood  up  these  armies  to  defend  his  home 
against  the  grim  attacking  armies  of  want/ ' 

Telfer  stopped  and  stood  in  the  road  with  his  legs 
spread  apart.  He  took  off  his  hat  and  throwing  back 
his  head  laughed  up  at  the  stars. 

"Freedom  Smith  should  hear  me  now,"  he  cried,  rock 
ing  back  and  forth  with  laughter  and  switching  his 
cane  at  the  boy's  legs  so  that  Sam  had  to  hop  merrily 
about  in  the  road  to  avoid  it.  "Flung  by  the  hand  of 


68  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

God  out  of  illimitable  space — eh !  not  bad,  eh !  I  should 
be  in  Congress.  I  am  wasted  here.  I  am  throwing 
priceless  eloquence  to  dogs  who  prefer  to  chase  rabbits 
and  to  a  boy  who  is  the  worst  little  money  grubber  in 
the  town." 

The  midsummer  madness  that  had  seized  Telfer  passed 
and  for  a  time  he  walked  in  silence.  Suddenly,  putting 
his  arm  on  the  boy's  shoulder,  he  stopped  and  pointed 
to  where  a  faint  light  in  the  sky  marked  the  lighted 
town. 

'They  are  good  people,"  he  said,  "but  their  ways  are 
not  my  ways  or  your  ways.  You  will  go  out  of  the 
town.  You  have  genius.  You  will  be  a  man  of  finance. 
I  have  watched  you.  You  are  not  niggardly  and  you 
do  not  cheat  and  lie — result — you  will  not  be  a  little  busi 
ness  man.  What  have  you?  You  have  the  gift  of  seeing 
dollars  where  the  rest  of  the  boys  of  the  town  see  noth 
ing  and  you  are  tireless  after  those  dollars — you  will 
be  a  big  man  of  dollars,  it  is  plain."  Into  his  voice  came 
a  touch  of  bitterness.  "I  also  was  marked  out.  Why 
do  I  carry  a  cane?  Why  do  I  not  buy  a  farm  and  raise 
steers  ?  I  am  the  most  worthless  thing  alive.  I  have  the 
touch  of  genius  without  the  energy  to  make  it  count." 

Sam's  mind  that  had  been  inflamed  by  the  kiss  of  the 
girl  cooled  in  the  presence  of  Telfer.  In  the  summer 
madness  of  the  talking  man  there  was  something  sooth 
ing  to  the  fever  in  his  blood.  He  followed  the  words 
eagerly,  seeing  pictures,  getting  thrills,  filled  with  happi 
ness. 

At  the  edge  of  town  a  buggy  passed  the  walking  pair. 
In  the  buggy  sat  a  young  farmer,  his  arm  about  the 
waist  of  a  girl,  her  head  upon  his  shoulder.  Far  in  the 
distance  sounded  the  faint  call  of  the  dogs.  Sam  and 
Telfer  sat  down  on  a  grassy  bank  under  a  tree  while  Tel 
fer  rolled  and  lighted  a  cigarette. 

"As  I  promised,  I  will  talk  to  you  of  love,"  he  said, 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  69 

making  a  wide  sweep  with  his  arm  each  time  as  he  put 
his  cigarette  into  his  mouth. 

The  grassy  bank  on  which  they  lay  had  the  rich,  burned 
smell  of  the  hot  days.  A  wind  rustled  the  standing  corn 
that  formed  a  kind  of  wall  behind  them.  The  moon  was 
in  the  sky  and  shone  down  across  bank  after  bank  of 
serried  clouds.  The  grandiloquence  went  out  of  the  voice 
of  Telfer  and  his  face  became  serious. 

"My  foolishness  is  more  than  half  earnest,"  he  said. 
"I  think  that  a  man  or  boy  who  has  set  for  himself  a 
task  had  better  let  women  and  girls  alone.  If  he  be  a 
man  of  genius,  he  has  a  purpose  independent  of  all  the 
world,  and  should  cut  and  slash  and  pound  his  way 
toward  his  mark,  forgetting  every  one,  particularly  the 
woman  that  would  come  to  grips  with  him.  She  also  has 
a  mark  toward  which  she  goes.  She  is  at  war  with  him 
and  has  a  purpose  that  is  not  his  purpose.  She  believes 
that  the  pursuit  of  women  is  an  end  for  a  life.  For 
all  they  now  condemn  Mike  McCarthy  who  went  to  the 
asylum  because  of  them  and  who,  while  loving  life,  came 
near  to  taking  life,  the  women  of  Caxton  do  not  condemn 
his  madness  for  themselves;  they  do  not  blame  him  for 
loitering  away  his  good  years  or  for  making  an  abortive 
mess  of  his  good  brain.  While  he  made  an  art  of  the 
pursuit  of  women  they  applauded  secretly.  Did  not 
twelve  of  them  accept  the  challenge  thrown  out  by  his 
eyes  as  he  loitered  in  the  streets?" 

The  man,  who  had  begun  talking  quietly  and  seriously, 
raised  his  voice  and  waved  the  lighted  cigarette  in  the 
air  and  the  boy  who  had  begun  to  think  again  of  the 
dark-skinned  daughter  of  banker  Walker  listened  atten 
tively.  The  barking  of  the  dogs  grew  nearer. 

"If  you  as  a  boy  can  get  from  me,  a  grown  man,  an 
understanding  of  the  purpose  of  women  you  will  not  have 
lived  in  this  town  for  nothing.  Set  your  mark  at  money 
making  if  you  will,  but  drive  at  that.  Let  yourself  but 


70  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

go  and  a  sweet  wistful  pair  of  eyes  seen  in  a  street  crowd 
or  a  pair  of  little  feet  running  over  a  dance  floor  will 
retard  your  growth  for  years.  No  man  or  boy  can  grow 
toward  the  purpose  of  a  life  while  he  thinks  of  women. 
Let  him  try  it  and  he  will  be  undone.  What  is  to  him 
a  passing  humour  is  to  them  an  end.  They  are  diaboli 
cally  clever.  They  will  run  and  stop  and  run  and  stop 
again,  keeping  just  without  his  reach.  He  sees  them  here 
and  there  about  him.  His  mind  is  filled  with  vague  de 
licious  thoughts  that  come  out  of  the  very  air;  before  he 
realises  what  he  has  done  he  has  spent  his  years  in  vain 
pursuit  and  turning  finds  himself  old  and  undone." 

Telfer  began  jabbing  at  the  ground  with  his  stick. 

"I  had  my  chance.  In  New  York  I  had  money  to  live 
on  and  time  to  have  made  an  artist  of  myself.  I  won 
prize  after  prize.  The  master,  walking  up  and  down 
back  of  us,  lingered  longest  over  my  easel.  There  was, 
a  fellow  sat  beside  me  who  had  nothing.  I  made  sport 
of  him  and  called  him  Sleepy  Jock  after  a  dog  we  used 
to  have  about  our  house  here  in  Caxton.  Now  I  am 
here  idly  waiting  for  death  and  that  Jock,  where  is  he? 
Only  last  week  I  saw  in  a  paper  that  he  had  won  a  place 
among  the  world's  great  artists  by  a  picture  he  has 
painted.  In  the  school  I  watched  for  a  look  in  the  eyes 
of  the  girl  students  and  went  about  with  them  night 
after  night  winning,  like  Mike  McCarthy,  fruitless  vic 
tories.  Sleepy  Jock  had  the  best  of  it.  He  did  not 
look  about  with  open  eyes  but  kept  peering  instead  at  the 
face  of  the  master.  My  days  were  full  of  small  suc 
cesses.  I  could  wear  clothes.  I  could  make  soft-eyed 
girls  turn  to  look  at  me  in  a  dance  hall.  I  remember 
a  night.  We  students  gave  a  dance  and  Sleepy  Jock 
came.  He  went  about  asking  for  dances  and  the  girls 
laughed  and  told  him  they  had  none  to  give,  that  the 
dances  were  taken.  I  followed  him  and  had  my  ears 
filled  with  flattery  and  my  card  with  names.  In  riding 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  71 

the  wave  of  small  success  I  got  the  habit  of  small  success. 
When  I  could  not  catch  the  line  I  wanted  to  make  a  draw 
ing  live,  I  dropped  my  pencil  and,  taking  a  girl  upon 
my  arm,  went  for  a  day  in  the  country.  Once,  sitting 
in  a  restaurant,  I  overheard  two  women  talking  of  the 
beauty  of  my  eyes  and  was  made  happy  for  a  week/' 

Telfer  threw  up  his  hands  in  disgust. 

"My  flow  of  words,  my  ready  trick  of  talking;  to  what 
does  it  bring  me  ?  Let  me  tell  you.  It  has  brought  me 
to  this — that  at  fifty  I,  who  might  have  been  an  artist 
fixing  the  minds  of  thousands  upon  some  thing  of  beauty 
or  of  truth,  have  become  a  village  cut-up,  a  pot-house 
wit,  a  flinger  of  idle  words  into  the  air  of  a  village  intent 
upon  raising  corn. 

"If  you  ask  me  why,  I  tell  you  that  my  mind  was 
paralysed  by  small  success  and  if  you  ask  me  where  I 
got  the  taste  for  that,  I  tell  you  that  I  got  it  when  I  saw 
it  lurking  in  a  woman's  eyes  and  heard  the  pleasant  little 
songs  that  lull  to  sleep  upon  a  woman's  lips." 

The  boy,  sitting  upon  the  grassy  bank  beside  Telfer, 
began  thinking  of  life  in  Caxton.  The  man  smoking 
the  cigarette  fell  into  one  of  his  rare  silences.  The  boy 
thought  of  girls  that  had  come  into  his  mind  at  night, 
of  how  he  had  been  thrilled  by  a  glance  from  the  eyes 
of  a  little  blue-eyed  school  girl  who  had  once  visited  at 
Freedom  Smith's  home  and  of  how  he  had  gone  at  night 
to  stand  under  her  window. 

In  Caxton  adolescent  love  had  about  it  a  virility  be 
fitting  a  land  that  raised  so  many  bushels  of  yellow  corn 
and  drove  so  many  fat  steers  through  the  streets  to  be 
loaded  upon  cars.  Men  and  women  went  their  ways 
believing,  with  characteristic  American  what-boots-it 
attitude  toward  the  needs  of  childhood,  that  it  was 
well  for  growing  boys  and  girls  to  be  much  alone  to 
gether.  To  leave  them  alone  together  was  a  principle 
with  them.  When  a  young  man  called  upon  his  sweet- 


72  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

heart,  her  parents  sat  in  the  presence  of  the  two  with 
apologetic  eyes  and  presently  disappeared  leaving  them 
alone  together.  When  boys'  and  girls'  parties  were  given 
in  Caxton  houses,  parents  went  away  leaving  the  children 
to  shift  for  themselves. 

"Now  have  a  good  time  and  don't  tear  the  house 
down,"  they  said,  going  off  upstairs. 

Left  to  themselves  the  children  played  kissing  games 
and  young  men  and  tall  half-formed  girls  sat  on  the  front 
porches  in  the  darkness,  thrilled  and  half  frightened,  get 
ting  through  their  instincts,  crudely  and  without  guidance, 
their  first  peep  at  the  mystery  of  life.  They  kissed  pas 
sionately  and  the  young  men,  walking  home,  lay  upon 
their  beds  fevered  and  unnaturally  aroused,  thinking 
thoughts. 

Young  men  went  into  the  company  of  girls  time  and 
again  without  knowing  aught  of  them  except  that  they 
caused  a  stirring  of  their  whole  being,  a  kind  of  riot  of 
the  senses  to  which  they  returned  on  other  evenings  as 
a  drunkard  to  his  cups.  After  such  an  evening  they 
found  themselves,  on  the  next  morning,  confused  and 
filled  with  vague  longings.  They  had  lost  their  keen 
ness  for  fun,  they  heard  without  hearing  the  talk  of  the 
men  about  the  station  and  in  the  stores,  they  went  slinking 
through  the  streets  in  groups  and  people  seeing  them 
nodded  their  heads  and  said,  "It  is  the  loutish  age." 

If  Sam  did  not  have  a  loutish  age  it  was  due  to  his 
tireless  struggle  to  increase  the  totals  at  the  foot  of 
the  pages  in  the  yellow  bank  book,  to  the  growing  ill 
health  of  his  mother  that  had  begun  to  frighten  him,  and 
to  the  society  of  Valmore,  Wildman,  Freedom  Smith, 
and  the  man  who  now  sat  musing  beside  him.  He  began 
to  think  he  would  have  nothing  more  to  do  with  the 
Walker  girl.  He  remembered  his  sister's  affair  with  a 
young  farmer  and  shuddered  at  the  crude  vulgarity  of  it. 
He  looked  over  the  shoulder  of  the  man  sitting  beside 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  73 

him  absorbed  in  thought,  and  saw  the  rolling  fields 
stretched  away  in  the  moonlight  and  into  his  mind  came 
Telfer's  speech.  So  vivid,  so  moving,  seemed  the  pic 
ture  of  the  armies  of  standing  corn  which  men  had  set 
up  in  the  fields  to  protect  themselves  against  the  march  of 
pitiless  Nature,  and  Sam,  holding  the  picture  in  his  mind 
as  he  followed  the  sense  of  Telfer's  talk,  thought  that  all 
society  had  resolved  itself  into  a  few  sturdy  souls  who 
went  on  and  on  regardless,  and  a  hunger  to  make  of 
himself  such  another  arose  engulfing  him.  The  desire 
within  him  seemed  so  compelling  that  he  turned  and 
haltingly  tried  to  express  what  was  in  his  mind. 

"I  will  try/'  he  stammered,  "I  will  try  to  be  a  man. 
I  will  try  to  not  have  anything  to  do  with  them — with 
women.  I  will  work  and  make  money — and — and " 

Speech  left  him.  He  rolled  over  and  lying  on  his 
stomach  looked  at  the  ground. 

"To  Hell  with  women  and  girls,"  he  burst  forth  as 
though  throwing  something  distasteful  out  of  his  throat. 

In  the  road  a  clamour  arose.  The  dogs,  giving  up  the 
pursuit  of  rabbits,  came  barking  and  growling  into  sight 
and  scampered  up  the  grassy  bank,  covering  the  man  and 
the  boy.  Shaking  off  the  reaction  upon  his  sensitive  na 
ture  of  the  emotions  of  the  boy  Teller  arose.  His  sang 
froid  had  returned  to  him.  Cutting  right  and  left  with  his 
stick  at  the  dogs  he  cried  joyfully,  "We  have  had  enough 
of  eloquence  from  man,  boy  and  dog.  We  will  be  on  our 
way.  We  will  get  this  boy  Sam  home  and  tucked  into 
bed." 


CHAPTER   V 

SAM  was  a  half-grown  man  of  fifteen  when  the  call 
of  the  city  came  to  him.  For  six  years  he  had  been  upon 
the  streets.  He  had  seen  the  sun  come  up  hot  and  red 
over  the  corn  fields,  and  had  stumbled  through  the  streets 
in  the  bleak  darkness  of  winter  mornings  when  the  trains 
from  the  north  came  into  Caxton  covered  with  ice,  and 
the  trainmen  stood  on  the  deserted  little  platform  whip 
ping  their  arms  and  calling  to  Jerry  Donlin  to  hurry  with 
his  work  that  they  might  get  back  into  the  warm  stale 
air  of  the  smoking  car. 

In  the  six  years  the  boy  had  grown  more  and  more 
determined  to  become  a  man  of  money.  Fed  by  banker 
Walker,  the  silent  mother,  and  in  some  subtle  way  by 
the  very  air  he  breathed,  the  belief  within  him  that  to 
make  money  and  to  have  money  would  in  some  way  make 
up  for  the  old  half-forgotten  humiliations  in  the  life 
of  the  McPherson  family  and  would  set  it  on  a  more 
secure  foundation  than  the  wobbly  Windy  had  provided, 
grew  and  influenced  his  thoughts  and  his  acts.  Tire 
lessly  he  kept  at  his  efforts  to  get  ahead.  In  his  bed  at 
night  he  dreamed  of  dollars.  Jane  McPherson  had  her 
self  a  passion  for  frugality.  In  spite  of  Windy 's  in 
competence  and  her  own  growing  ill  health,  she  would 
not  permit  the  family  to  go  into  debt,  and  although,  in 
the  long  hard  winters,  Sam  sometimes  ate  cornmeal  mush 
until  his  mind  revolted  at  the  thought  of  a  corn  field, 
yet  was  the  rent  of  the  little  house  paid  on  the  scratch, 
and  her  boy  fairly  driven  to  increase  the  totals  in 
the  yellow  bank  book.  Even  Valmore,  who  since  the 

74 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  75 

death  of  his  wife  had  lived  in  a  loft  above  his  shop  and 
who  was  a  blacksmith  of  the  old  days,  a  workman  first 
and  a  money  maker  later,  did  not  despise  the  thought 
of  gain. 

"It  is  money  makes  the  mare  go/'  he  said  with  a  kind 
of  reverence  as  banker  Walker,  fat,  sleek,  and  prosperous, 
walked  pompously  out  of  Wildman's  grocery. 

Of  John  Telfer's  attitude  toward  money-making,  the 
boy  was  uncertain.  The  man  followed  with  joyous  aban 
donment  the  impulse  of  the  moment. 

"That's  right,"  he  cried  impatiently  when  Sam,  who 
had  begun  to  express  opinions  at  the  gatherings  in  the 
grocery,  pointed  out  hesitatingly  that  the  papers  took  ac 
count  of  men  of  wealth  no  matter  what  their  achieve 
ments,  "Make  money!  Cheat!  Lie!  Be  one  of  the  men 
of  the  big  world !  Get  your  name  up  for  a  modern,  high- 
class  American!" 

And  in  the  next  breath,  turning  upon  Freedom  Smith 
who  had  begun  to  berate  the  boy  for  not  sticking  to  the 
schools  and  who  predicted  that  the  day  would  come 
when  Sam  would  regret  his  lack  of  book  learning,  he 
shouted,  "Let  the  schools  go !  They  are  but  musty  beds 
in  which  old  clerkliness  lies  asleep !" 

Among  the  travelling  men  who  came  to  Caxton  to  sell 
goods,  the  boy,  who  had  continued  the  paper  selling  even 
after  attaining  the  stature  of  a  man,  was  a  favourite.  Sit 
ting  in  chairs  before  the  New  Leland  House  they  talked 
to  him  of  the  city  and  of  the  money  to  be  made  there. 

"It  is  the  place  for  a  live  young  man,"  they  said. 

Sam  had  a  talent  for  drawing  people  into  talk  of 
themselves  and  of  their  affairs  and  began  to  cultivate 
travelling  men.  From  them,  he  got  into  his  nostrils  a 
whiff  of  the  city  and,  listening  to  them,  he  saw  the  great 
ways  filled  with  hurrying  people,  the  tall  buildings  touch 
ing  the  sky,  the  men  running  about  intent  upon  money- 
making,  and  the  clerks  going  on  year  after  year  on  small 


76  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

salaries  getting  nowhere,  a  part  of,  and  yet  not  under 
standing,  the  impulses  and  motives  of  the  enterprises 
that  supported  them. 

In  this  picture  Sam  thought  he  saw  a  place  for  him 
self.  He  conceived  of  life  in  the  city  as  a  great  game 
in  which  he  believed  he  could  play  a  sterling  part.  Had 
he  not  in  Caxton  brought  something  out  of  nothing,  had 
he  not  systematised  and  monopolised  the  selling  of  papers, 
had  he  not  introduced  the  vending  of  popcorn  and  pea 
nuts  from  baskets  to  the  Saturday  night  crowds?  Al 
ready  boys  went  out  in  his  employ,  already  the  totals 
in  the  bank  book  had  crept  to  more  than  seven  hundred 
dollars.  He  felt  within  him  a  glow  of  pride  at  the 
thought  of  what  he  had  done  and  would  do. 

"I  will  be  richer  than  any  man  in  town  here,"  he  de 
clared  in  his  pride.  "I  will  be  richer  than  Ed  Walker." 

Saturday  night  was  the  great  night  in  Caxton  life. 
For  it  the  clerks  in  the  stores  prepared,  for  it  Sam  sent 
forth  his  peanut  and  popcorn  venders,  for  it  Art  Sher 
man  rolled  up  his  sleeves  and  put  the  glasses  close  by 
the  beer  tap  under  the  bar,  and  for  it  the  mechanics,  the 
farmers,  and  the  labourers  dressed  in  their  Sunday  best 
and  came  forth  to  mingle  with  their  fellows.  On  Main 
Street  crowds  packed  the  stores,  the  sidewalks,  and  drink 
ing  places,  and  men  stood  about  in  groups  talking  while 
young  girls  with  their  lovers  walked  up  and  down.  In  the 
hall  over  Geiger's  drug  store  a  dance  went  on  and 
the  voice  of  the  caller-off  rose  above  the  clatter  of  voices 
and  the  stamping  of  horses  in  the  street.  Now  and  then 
a  fight  broke  out  among  the  roisterers  in  Piety  Hollow. 
Once  a  young  farm  hand  was  killed  with  a  knife. 

In  and  out  through  the  crowd  Sam  went,  pressing  his 
wares. 

"Remember  the  long  quiet  Sunday  afternoon,"  he  said, 
pushing  a  paper  into  the  hands  of  a  slow-thinking  farmer. 
"Recipes  for  cooking  new  dishes,"  he  urged  to  the  farm- 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  77 

er's  wife.  "There  is  a  page  of  new  fashions  in  dress," 
he  told  the  young  girl. 

Not  until  the  last  light  was  out  in  the  last  saloon  in 
Piety  Hollow,  and  the  last  roisterer  had  driven  off  into 
the  darkness  carrying  a  Saturday  paper  in  his  pocket,  did 
Sam  close  the  day's  business. 

And  it  was  on  a  Saturday  night  that  he  decided  to 
drop  paper  selling. 

"I  will  take  you  into  business  with  me,"  announced 
Freedom  Smith,  stopping  him  as  he  hurried  by.  "You 
are  getting  too  old  to  sell  papers  and  you  know  too  much." 

Sam,  still  intent  upon  the  money  to  be  made  on  that 
particular  Saturday  night,  did  not  stop  to  discuss  the 
matter  with  Freedom,  but  for  a  year  he  had  been  looking 
quietly  about  for  something  to  go  into  and  now  he  nodded 
his  head  as  he  hurried  away. 

"It  is  the  end  of  romance,"  shouted  Telfer,  who  stood 
beside  Freedom  Smith  before  Geiger's  drug  store  and 
who  had  heard  the  offer.  "A  boy,  who  has  seen  the  se 
cret  workings  of  my  mind,  who  has  heard  me  spout  Poe 
and  Browning,  will  become  a  merchant,  dealing  in  stink 
ing  hides.  I  am  overcome  by  the  thought." 

The  next  day,  sitting  in  the  garden  back  of  his  house, 
Telfer  talked  to  Sam  of  the  matter  at  length. 

"For  you,  my  boy,  I  put  the  matter  of  money  in  the 
first  place,"  he  declared,  leaning  back  in  his  chair,  smok 
ing  a  cigarette  and  from  time  to  time  tapping  Eleanor  on 
the  shoulder  with  his  cane.  "For  any  boy  I  put  money- 
making  in  the  first  place.  It  is  only  women  and  fools  who 
despise  money-making.  Look  at  Eleanor  here.  The  time 
and  thought  she  puts  into  the  selling  of  hats  would  be 
the  death  of  me,  but  it  has  been  the  making  of  her.  See 
how  fine  and  purposeful  she  has  become.  Without  the 
millinery  business  she  would  be  a  purposeless  fool  intent 
upon  clothes  and  with  it  she  is  all  a  woman  should  be. 
It  is  like  a  child  to  her." 


78  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

Eleanor,  who  had  turned  to  laugh  at  her  husband, 
looked  instead  at  the  ground  and  a  shadow  crossed  her 
face.  Telfer,  who  had  begun  talking  thoughtlessly,  out 
of  his  excess  of  words,  glanced  from  the  woman  to  the 
boy.  He  knew  that  the  suggestion  regarding  a  child  had 
touched  a  secret  regret  in  Eleanor,  and  began  trying  to 
efface  the  shadow  on  her  face  by  throwing  himself  into 
the  subject  that  chanced  to  be  on  his  tongue,  making  the 
words  roll  and  tumble  from  his  lips. 

"No  matter  what  may  come  in  the  future,  in  our  day 
money-making  precedes  many  virtues  that  are  forever 
on  men's  lips/'  he  declared  fiercely  as  though  trying  to 
down  an  opponent.  "It  is  one  of  the  virtues  that  proves 
man  not  a  savage.  It  has  lifted  him  up — not  money- 
making,  but  the  power  to  make  money.  Money  makes, 
life  livable.  It  gives  freedom  and  destroys  fear.  Having 
it  means  sanitary  houses  and  well-made  clothes.  It 
brings  into  men's  lives  beauty  and  the  love  of  beauty. 
It  enables  a  man  to  go  adventuring  after  the  stuff  of 
life  as  I  have  done. 

"Writers  are  fond  of  telling  stories  of  the  crude  ex 
cesses  of  great  wealth,"  he  went  on  hurriedly,  glancing 
again  at  Eleanor.  "No  doubt  the  things  they  tell  of  do 
happen.  Money,  and  not  the  ability  and  the  instinct  to 
make  money,  is  at  fault.  And  what  of  the  cruder  ex 
cesses  of  poverty,  the  drunken  men  who  beat  and  starve 
their  families,  the  grim  silences  of  the  crowded  unsani 
tary  houses  of  the  poor,  the  inefficient,  and  the  defeated? 
Go  sit  around  the  lounging  room  of  the  most  vapid  rich 
man's  city  club  as  I  have  done,  and  then  sit  among  the 
workers  of  a  factory  at  the  noon  hour.  Virtue,  you  will 
find,  is  no  fonder  of  poverty  than  you  and  I,  and  the 
man  who  has  merely  learned  to  be  industrious,  and  who 
has  not  acquired  that  eager  hunger  and  shrewdness  that 
enables  him  to  get  on,  may  build  up  a  strong  dexterous 
body  while  his  mind  is  diseased  and  decaying." 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  79 

Grasping  his  cane  and  beginning  to  be  carried  away 
by  the  wind  of  his  eloquence  Telfer  forgot  Eleanor  and 
talked  for  his  love  of  talking. 

"The  mind  that  has  in  it  the  love  of  the  beautiful, 
that  stuff  that  makes  our  poets,  artists,  musicians,  and 
actors,  needs  this  turn  for  shrewd  money  getting  or  it 
will  destroy  itself,"  he  declared.  "And  the  really  great 
artists  have  it.  In  books  and  stories  the  great  men  starve 
in  garrets.  In  real  life  they  are  more  likely  to  ride  in 
carriages  on  Fifth  Avenue  and  have  country  places  on 
the  Hudson.  Go,  see  for  yourself.  Visit  the  starving 
genius  in  his  garret.  It  is  a  hundred  to  one  that  you  will 
find  him  not  only  incapable  in  money  getting  but  also 
incapable  in  the  very  art  for  which  he  starves/' 

After  the  hurried  word  from  Freedom  Smith,  Sam  be 
gan  looking  for  a  buyer  for  the  paper  business.  The 
place  offered  appealed  to  him  and  he  wanted  a  chance  at 
it.  In  the  buying  of  potatoes,  butter,  eggs,  apples,  and 
hides  he  thought  he  could  make  money,  also,  he  knew  that 
the  dogged  persistency  with  which  he  had  kept  at  the 
putting  of  money  in  the  bank  had  caught  Freedom's 
imagination,  and  he  wanted  to  take  advantage  of  the 
fact. 

Within  a  few  days  the  deal  was  made.  Sam  got 
three  hundred  and  fifty  dollars  for  the  list  of  newspaper 
customers,  the  peanut  and  popcorn  business  and  the 
transfer  of  the  exclusive  agencies  he  had  arranged  with 
the  dailies  of  Des  Moines  and  St.  Louis.  Two  boys 
bought  the  business,  backed  by  their  fathers.  A  talk  in 
the  back  room  of  the  bank,  with  the  cashier  telling  of 
Sam's  record  as  a  depositor,  and  the  seven  hundred  dol 
lars  surplus  clinched  the  deal.  When  it  came  to  the 
deal  with  Freedom,  Sam  took  him  into  the  back  room  at 
the  bank  and  showed  his  savings  as  he  had  shown  them  to 
the  fathers  of  the  two  boys.  Freedom  was  impressed. 
He  thought  the  boy  would  make  money  for  him.  Twice 


go  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

within  a  week  Sam  had  seen  the  silent  suggestive  power 
of  cash. 

The  deal  Sam  made  with  Freedom  included  a  fair 
weekly  wage,  enough  to  more  than  take  care  of  all  his 
wants,  and  in  addition  he  was  to  have  two-thirds  of 
all  he  saved  Freedom  in  the  buying.  Freedom  on  the 
other  hand  was  to  furnish  horse,  vehicle,  and  keep  for 
the  horse,  while  Sam  was  to  take  care  of  the  horse.  The 
prices  to  be  paid  for  the  things  bought  were  to  be  fixed 
each  morning  by  Freedom,  and  if  Sam  bought  at  less 
than  the  prices  named  two-thirds  of  the  savings  went  to 
him.  The  arrangement  was  suggested  by  Sam,  who 
thought  he  would  make  more  from  the  saving  than  from 
the  wage. 

Freedom  Smith  discussed  even  the  most  trivial  matter 
in  a  loud  voice,  roaring  and  shouting  in  the  store  and 
on  the  streets.  He  was  a  great  inventor  of  descriptive 
names,  having  a  name  of  his  own  for  every  man,  woman 
and  child  he  knew  and  liked.  "Old  Maybe-Not"  he  called 
Windy  McPherson  and  would  roar  at  him  in  the  grocery 
asking  him  not  to  shed  rebel  blood  in  the  sugar  barrel. 
He  drove  about  the  country  in  a  low  phaeton  buggy  that 
rattled  and  squeaked  enormously  and  had  a  wide  rip  in 
the  top.  To  Sam's  knowledge  neither  the  buggy  nor 
Freedom  were  washed  during  his  stay  with  the  man.  He 
had  a  method  of  his  own  in  buying.  Stopping  in  front 
of  a  farm  house  he  would  sit  in  his  buggy  and  roar  until 
the  farmer  came  out  of  the  field  or  the  house  to  talk 
with  him.  And  then  haggling  and  shouting  he  would 
make  his  deal  or  drive  on  his  way  while  the  farmer, 
leaning  on  the  fence,  laughed  as  at  a  wayward  child. 

Freedom  lived  in  a  large  old  brick  house  facing  one 
of  Caxton's  best  streets.  His  house  and  yard  were  an 
eyesore  to  his  neighbours  who  liked  him  personally.  He 
knew  this  and  would  stand  on  his  front  porch  laughing 
and  roaring  about  it.  "Good  morning,  Mary/'  he  would 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  81 

shout  at  the  neat  German  woman  across  the  street.  "Wait 
and  you'll  see  me  clean  up  about  here.  I'm  going  at  it 
right  now.  I'm  going  to  brush  the  flies  off  the  fence 
first." 

Once  he  ran  for  a  county  office  and  got  practically 
every  vote  in  the  county. 

Freedom  had  a  passion  for  buying  up  old  half -worn 
buggies  and  agricultural  implements,  bringing  them  home 
to  stand  in  the  yard,  gathering  rust  and  decay,  and  swear 
ing  they  were  as  good  as  new.  In  the  lot  were  a  half 
dozen  buggies  and  a  family  carriage  or  two,  a  traction 
engine,  a  mowing  machine,  several^  farm  wagons  and 
other  farm  tools  gone  beyond  naming.  Every  few  days 
he  came  home  bringing  a  new  prize.  They  overflowed 
the  yard  and  crept  onto  the  porch.  Sam  never  knew  him 
to  sell  any  of  this  stuff.  He  had  at  one  time  sixteen 
sets  of  harness  all  broken  and  unrepaired  in  the  barn  and 
in  a  shed  back  of  the  house.  A  great  flock  of  chickens 
and  two  or  three  pigs  wandered  about  among  this  junk 
and  all  the  children  of  the  neighbourhood  joined  Free 
dom's  four  and  ran  howling  and  shouting  over  and  under 
the  mass. 

Freedom's  wife,  a  pale,  silent  woman,  rarely  came  out 
of  the  house.  She  had  a  liking  for  the  industrious,  hard 
working  Sam  and  occasionally  stood  at  the  back  door  and 
talked  with  him  in  a  low,  even  voice  at  evening  as  he 
stood  unhitching  his  horse  after  a  day  on  the  road.  Both 
she  and  Freedom  treated  him  with  great  respect. 

As  a  buyer  Sam  was  even  more  successful  than  at 
the  paper  selling.  He  was  a  buyer  by  instinct,  working 
a  wide  stretch  of  country  very  systematically  and  within 
a  year  more  than  doubling  the  bulk  of  Freedom's  pur 
chases. 

There  is  a  little  of  Windy  McPherson's  grotesque  pre 
tentiousness  in  every  man  and  his  son  soon  learned  to 
look  for  and  to  take  advantage  of  it.  He  let  men  talk 


82  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

until  they  had  exaggerated  or  overstated  the  value  of 
their  goods,  then  called  them  sharply  to  accounts,  and  be 
fore  they  had  recovered  from  their  confusion  drove 
home  the  bargain.  In  Sam's  day,  farmers  did  not  watch 
the  daily  market  reports,  in  fact,  the  markets  were  not 
systematised  and  regulated  as  they  were  later,  and  the 
skill  of  the  buyer  was  of  the  first  importance.  Having 
the  skill,  Sam  used  it  constantly  to  put  money  into  his 
pockets,  but  in  some  way  kept  the  confidence  and  respect 
of  the  men  with  whom  he  traded. 

The  noisy,  blustering  Freedom  was  as  proud  as  a 
father  of  the  trading  ability  that  developed  in  the  boy 
and  roared  his  name  up  and  down  the  streets  and  in  the 
stores,  declaring  him  the  smartest  boy  in  Iowa. 

"Mighty  little  of  old  Maybe-Not  in  that  boy,"  he 
would  shout  to  the  loafers  in  the  store. 

Although  Sam  had  an  almost  painful  desire  for  order 
and  system  in  his  own  affairs,  he  did  not  try  to  bring 
these  influences  into  Freedom's  affairs,  but  kept  his  own 
records  carefully  and  bought  potatoes  and  apples,  butter 
and  eggs,  furs  and  hides,  with  untiring  zeal,  working 
always  to  swell  his  commissions.  Freedom  took  the  risks 
in  the  business  and  many  times  profited  little,  but  the 
two  liked  and  respected  each  other  and  it  was  through 
Freedom's  efforts  that  Sam  finally  got  out  of  Caxton  and 
into  larger  affairs. 

One  evening  in  the  late  fall  Freedom  came  into  the 
stable  where  Sam  stood  taking  the  harness  off  his  horse. 

"Here  is  a  chance  for  you,  my  boy,"  he  said,  putting 
his  hand  affectionately  on  Sam's  shoulder.  There  was 
a  note  of  tenderness  in  his  voice.  He  had  written  to 
the  Chicago  firm  to  whom  he  sold  most  of  the  things  he 
bought,  telling  of  Sam  and  his  ability,  and  the  firm  had 
replied  making  an  offer  that  Sam  thought  far  beyond 
anything  he  might  hope  for  in  Caxton.  In  his  hand  he 
held  this  offer. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  83 

When  Sam  read  the  letter  his  heart  jumped.  He 
thought  that  it  opened  for  him  a  wide  new  field  of  effort 
and  of  money  making.  He  thought  that  at  last  he  had 
come  to  the  end  of  his  boyhood  and  was  to  have  his 
chance  in  the  city.  Only  that  morning  old  Doctor  Hark- 
ness  had  stopped  him  at  the  door  as  he  set  out  for  work 
and,  pointing  over  his  shoulder  with  his  thumb  to  where 
in  the  house  his  mother  lay,  wasted  and  asleep,  had  told 
him  that  in  another  week  she  would  be  gone,  and  Sam, 
heavy  of  heart  and  filled  with  uneasy  longing,  had  walked 
through  the  streets  to  Freedom's  stable  wishing  that  he 
also  might  be  gone. 

Now  he  walked  across  the  stable  floor  and  hung  the 
harness  he  had  taken  from  the  horse  upon  a  peg  in  the 
wall. 

"I  will  be  glad  to  go,"  he  said  heavily. 

Freedom  walked  out  of  the  stable  door  beside  the 
young  McPherson  who  had  come  to  him  as  a  boy  and  was 
now  a  broad-shouldered  young  man  of  eighteen.  He  did 
not  want  to  lose  Sam.  He  had  written  the  Chicago  com 
pany  because  of  his  affection  for  the  boy  and  because 
he  believed  him  capable  of  something  more  than  Caxton 
offered.  Now  he  walked  in  silence  holding  the  lantern 
aloof  and  guiding  the  way  among  the  wreckage  in  the 
yard,  filled  with  regrets. 

By  the  back  door  of  the  house  stood  the  pale,  tired- 
looking  wife  who,  putting  out  her  hand,  took  the  hand  of 
the  boy.  There  were  tears  in  her  eyes.  And  then  saying 
nothing  Sam  turned  and  hurried  off  up  the  street,  Free 
dom  and  his  wife  walked  to  the  front  gate  and  watched 
him  go.  From  a  street  corner,  where  he  stopped  in  the 
shadow  of  a  tree,  Sam  could  see  them  there,  the  wind 
swinging  the  lantern  in  Freedom's  hand  and  the  slender 
little  old  wife  making  a  white  blotch  against  the  darkness. 


CHAPTER   VI 

SAM  went  along  the  board  sidewalk  homeward  bound, 
hurried  by  the  driving  March  wind  that  had  sent  the 
lantern  swinging  in  Freedom's  hand.  At  the  front  of 
a  white  frame  residence  a  grey-haired  old  man  stood 
leaning  on  the  gate  and  looking  at  the  sky. 

"We  shall  have  a  rain,"  he  said  in  a  quavering  voice, 
as  though  giving  a  decision  in  the  matte^  and  then  turn 
ed  and  without  waiting  for  an  answer  went  along  a 
narrow  path  into  the  house. 

The  incident  brought  a  smile  to  Sam's  lips  followed 
by  a  kind  of  weariness  of  mind.  Since  the  beginning  of 
his  work  with  Freedom  he  had,  day  after  day,  come 
upon  Henry  Kimball  standing  by  his  gate  and  looking 
at  the  sky.  The  man  was  one  of  Sam's  old  newspaper 
customers  who  stood  as  a  kind  of  figure  in  the  town. 
It  was  said  of  him  that  in  his  youth  he  had  been  a  gam 
bler  on  the  Mississippi  River  and  that  he  had  taken  part 
in  more  than  one  wild  adventure  in  the  old  days.  After 
the  Civil  War  he  had  come  to  end  his  days  in  Caxton, 
living  alone  and  occupying  himself  by  keeping  year  after 
year  a  carefully  tabulated  record  of  weather  variations. 
Once  or  twice  a  month  during  the  warm  season  he  stum 
bled  into  Wildman's  and,  sitting  by  the  stove,  talked 
boastfully  of  the  accuracy  of  his  records  and  the  doings 
of  a  mangy  dog  that  trotted  at  his  heels.  In  his  present 
mood  the  endless  sameness  and  unevent fulness  of  the 
man's  life  seemed  to  Sam  amusing  and  in  some  way  sad. 

"To  depend  upon  going  to  the  gate  and  looking  at 
the  sky  to  give  point  to  a  day — to  look  forward  to  and 

84 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  85 

depend  upon  that — what  deadliness!"  he  thought,  and, 
thrusting  his  hand  into  his  pocket,  felt  with  pleasure 
the  letter  from  the  Chicago  company  that  was  to  open 
so  much  of  the  big  outside  world  to  him. 

In  spite  of  the  shock  of  unexpected  sadness  that  had 
come  with  what  he  felt  was  almost  a  definite  parting  with 
Freedom,  and  the  sadness  brought  on  by  his  mother's 
approaching  death,  Sam  felt  a  strong  thrill  of  confidence 
in  his  own  future  that  made  his  homeward  walk  almost 
cheerful.  The  thrill  got  from  reading  the  letter  handed 
him  by  Freedom  was  renewed  by  the  sight  of  old  Henry 
Kimball  at  the  gate,  looking  at  the  sky. 

"I  shall  never  be  like  that,  sitting  in  a  corner  of  the 
world  watching  a  mangy  dog  chase  a  ball  and  peering  day 
after  day  at  a  thermometer/'  he  thought. 

The  three  years  in  Freedom  Smith's  service  had  taught 
Sam  not  to  doubt  his  ability  to  cope  with  such  busi 
ness  problems  as  might  come  in  his  way.  He  knew  that 
he  had  become  what  he  wanted  to  be,  a  good  business 
man,  one  of  the  men  who  direct  and  control  the  affairs 
in  which  they  are  concerned  because  of  a  quality  in 
them  called  Business  Sense.  He  recalled  with  pleasure 
the  fact  that  the  men  of  Caxton  had  stopped  calling  him 
a  bright  boy  and  now  spoke  of  him  as  a  good  business 
man. 

At  the  gate  before  his  own  house  he  stopped  and  stood 
thinking  of  these  things  and  of  the  dying  woman  within. 
Back  into  his  mind  came  the  old  man  he  had  seen  at  the 
gate  and  with  him  the  thought  that  his  mother's  life  had 
been  as  barren  as  that  of  the  man  who  depended  for 
companionship  upon  a  dog  and  a  thermometer. 

"Indeed,"  he  said  to  himself,  pursuing  the  thought, 
"it  has  been  worse.  She  has  not  had  a  fortune  on  which 
to  live  in  peace  nor  has  she  had  the  remembrance  of 
youthful  days  of  wild  adventure  that  must  comfort  the 
last  days  of  the  old  man.  Instead  she  has  been  watch- 


86  WINDY  McPHERSON'S   SON 

ing  me  as  the  old  man  watches  his  thermometer  and 
Father  has  been  the  dog  in  her  house  chasing  playthings. ' ' 

The  figure  pleased  him.  He  stood  at  the  gate,  the  wind 
singing  in  the  trees  along  the  street  and  driving  an  oc 
casional  drop  of  rain  against  his  cheek,  and  thought  of 
it  and  of  his  life  with  his  mother.  During  the  last 
two  or  three  years  he  had  been  trying  to  make  things  up 
to  her.  After  the  sale  of  the  newspaper  business  and 
the  beginning  of  his  success  with  Freedom  he  had  driven 
her  from  the  washtub  and  since  the  beginning  of  her  ill 
health  he  had  spent  evening  after  evening  with  her  in 
stead  of  going  to  Wildman's  to  sit  with  the  four  friends 
and  hear  the  talk  that  went  on  among  them.  No  more 
did  he  walk  with  Telfer  or  Mary  Underwood  on  country 
roads  but  sat,  instead,  by  the  bedside  of  the  sick 
woman  or,  the  night  falling  fair,  helped  her  to  an  arm 
chair  upon  the  grass  plot  at  the  front  of  the  houseX 

The  years,  Sam  felt,  had  been  good  years.  They  had 
brought  him  an  understanding  of  his  mother  and  had 
given  a  seriousness  and  purpose  to  the  ambitious  plans 
he  continued  to  make  for  himself.  Alone  together,  the 
mother  and  he  had  talked  little,  the  habit  of  a  lifetime 
making  much  speech  impossible  to  her  and  the  growing 
understanding  of  her  making  it  unnecessary  to  him.  Now 
in  the  darkness,  before  the  house,  he  thought  of  the 
evenings  he  had  spent  with  her  and  of  the  pitiful  waste 
that  had  been  made  of  her  fine  life.  Things  that  had 
hurt  him  and  against  which  he  had  been  bitter  and  un 
forgiving  became  of  small  import,  even  the  doings  of 
the  pretentious  Windy,  who  in  the  face  of  Jane's  ill 
ness  continued  to  go  off  after  pension  day  for  long  pe 
riods  of  drunkenness,  and  who  only  came  home  to  weep 
and  wail  through  the  house,  when  the  pension  money 
was  gone,  regretting,  Sam  tried  in  fairness  to  think, 
the  loss  of  both  the  washwoman  and  the  wife. 

"She  has  been  the  most  wonderful  woman   in  the 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  87 

world,"  he  told  himself  and  tears  of  happiness  came  into 
his  eyes  at  the  thought  of  his  friend,  John  Telfer,  who 
in  bygone  days  had  praised  the  mother  to  the  news 
boy  trotting  beside  him  on  moonlit  roads.  Into  his  mind 
came  a  picture  of  her  long  gaunt  face,  ghastly  now 
against  the  white  of  the  pillows.  A  picture  of  George 
Eliot,  tacked  to  the  wall  behind  a  broken  harness  in 
the  kitchen  of  Freedom  Smith's  house,  had  caught  his 
eye  some  days  before,  and  in  the  darkness  he  took  it 
from  his  pocket  and  put  it  to  his  lips,  realising  that  in 
some  indescribable  way  it  was  like  his  mother  as  she  had 
been  before  her  illness.  Freedom's  wife  had  given  him 
the  picture  and  he  had  been  carrying  it,  taking  it  out  of 
his  pocket  on  lonely  stretches  of  road  as  he  went  about 
his  work. 

Sam  went  quietly  around  the  house  and  stood  by  an 
old  shed,  a  relic  of  an  attempt  by  Windy  to  embark  in 
raising  chickens.  He  wanted  to  continue  the  thoughts  of 
his  mother.  He  began  recalling  her  youth  and  the  de 
tails  of  a  long  talk  they  had  held  together  on  the  lawn 
before  the  house.  It  was  extraordinarily  vivid  in  his 
mind.  He  thought  that  even  now  he  could  remember 
every  word  that  had  been  said.  The  sick  woman  had 
talked  of  her  youth  in  Ohio,  and  as  she  talked  pictures 
had  come  into  the  boy's  mind.  She  had  told  him  of  her 
days  as  a  bound  girl  in  the  family  of  a  thin-lipped,  hard- 
fisted  New  Englander,  who  had  come  West  to  take  a 
farm,  and  of  her  struggles  to  obtain  an  education,  of 
the  pennies  saved  to  buy  books,  of  her  joy  when  she 
had  passed  examinations  and  become  a  school  teacher, 
and  of  her  marriage  to  Windy — then  John  McPherson. 

Into  the  Ohio  village  the  young  McPherson  had  come, 
to  cut  a  figure  in  the  town's  life.  Sam  had  smiled  at  the 
picture  she  drew  of  the  young  man  who  walked  up  and 
down  the  village  street  with  girls  on  his  arms,  and  who 
taught  a  Bible  class  in  the  Sunday  school. 


88  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

When  Windy  proposed  to  the  young  school  teacher 
she  had  accepted  him  eagerly,  thinking  it  unbelievably 
romantic  that  so  dashing  a  man  should  have  chosen  so 
obscure  a  figure  among  all  the  women  of  the  town. 

"And  even  now  I  am  not  sorry  although  it  has  meant 
nothing  but  labour  and  unhappiness  for  me/'  the  sick 
woman  had  told  her  son. 

After  marriage  to  the  young  dandy,  Jane  had  come 
with  him  to  Caxton  where  he  bought  a  store  and  where, 
within  three  years,  he  had  put  the  store  into  the  sheriff's 
hands  and  his  wife  into  the  position  of  town  laun 
dress. 

In  the  darkness  a  grim  smile,  half  scorn,  half  amuse 
ment,  had  flitted  across  the  face  of  the  dying  woman  as 
she  told  of  a  winter  when  Windy  and  another  young 
fellow  went,  from  schoolhouse  to  schoolhouse,  over  the 
state  giving  a  show.  The  ex-soldier  had  become  a  singer 
of  comic  songs  and  had  written  letter  after  letter  to  the 
young  wife  telling  of  the  applause  that  greeted  his  efforts. 
Sam  could  picture  the  performances,  the  little  dimly- 
lighted  schoolhouses  with  the  weatherbeaten  faces  shin 
ing  in  the  light  of  the  leaky  magic  lantern,  and  the  de 
lighted  Windy  running  here  and  there,  talking  the  jar 
gon  of  stageland,  arraying  himself  in  his  motley  and 
strutting  upon  the  little  stage. 

"And  all  winter  he  did  not  send  me  a  penny,"  the  sick 
woman  had  said,  interrupting  his  thoughts. 

Aroused  at  last  to  expression,  and  filled  with  the  mem 
ory  of  her  youth,  the  silent  woman  had  talked  of  her 
own  people.  Her  father  had  been  killed  in  the  woods  by 
a  falling  tree.  Of  her  mother  she  told  an  anecdote, 
touching  it  briefly  and  with  a  grim  humour  that  surprised 
her  son. 

The  young  school  teacher  had  gone  to  call  upon  her 
mother  once  and  for  an  hour  had  sat  in  the  parlour  of 
an  Ohio  farmhouse  while  a  fierce  old  woman  looked  at 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  89 

her  with  bold  questioning  eyes  that  made  the  daughter 
feel  she  had  been  a  fool  to  come. 

At  the  railroad  station  she  had  heard  an  anecdote  of 
her  mother.  The  story  ran,  that  once  a  burly  tramp  came 
to  the  farmhouse,  and  finding  the  woman  alone  tried 
to  bully  her,  and  that  the  tramp,  and  the  woman,  then 
in  her  prime,  fought  for  an  hour  in  the  back  yard 
of  the  house.  The  railroad  agent,  who  told  Jane  the 
story,  threw  back  his  head  and  laughed. 

"She  knocked  him  out,  too,"  he  said,  "knocked  him 
cold  upon  the  ground  and  then  filled  him  up  with  hard 
cider  so  that  he  came  reeling  into  town  declaring  her 
the  finest  woman  in  the  state." 

In  the  darkness  by  the  broken  shed  Sam's  mind  turned 
from  thoughts  of  his  mother  to  his  sister  Kate  and  of  her 
love  affair  with  the  young  farmer.  He  thought  with  sad 
ness  of  how  she  too  had  suffered  because  of  the  failings 
of  the  father,  of  how  she  had  been  compelled  to  go  out  of 
the  house  to  wander  in  the  dark  streets  to  avoid  the  end 
less  evenings  of  war  talk  always  brought  on  by  a  guest  in 
the  McPherson  household,  and  of  the  night  when,  getting 
a  rig  from  Culvert's  livery,  she  had  driven  off  alone  into 
the  country  to  return  in  triumph  to  pack  her  clothes  and 
show  her  wedding  ring. 

Before  him  there  rose  a  picture  of  a  summer  afternoon 
when  he  had  seen  a  part  of  the  love  making  that  had  pre 
ceded  this.  He  had  gone  into  the  store  to  see  his  sister 
when  the  young  farmer  came  in,  looked  awkwardly  about 
and  pushed  a  new  gold  watch  across  the  counter  to  Kate. 
A  sudden  wave  of  respect  for  his  sister  had  pervaded 
the  boy.  ''What  a  sum  it  must  have  cost,"  he  thought, 
and  looked  with  new  interest  at  the  back  of  the  lover  and 
at  the  flushed  cheek  and  shining  eyes  of  his  sister.  When 
the  lover,  turning,  had  seen  young  McPherson  standing 
at  the  counter,  he  laughed  self-consciously  and  walked  out 
at  the  door.  Kate  had  been  embarrassed  and  secretly 


90  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

pleased  and  flattered  by  the  look  in  her  brother's 
eyes,  but  had  pretended  to  treat  the  gift  lightly,  twirl 
ing  it  carelessly  back  and  forth  on  the  counter  and  walk 
ing  up  and  down  swinging  her  arms. 

"Don't  go  telling,"  she  had  said. 

"Then  don't  go  pretending,"  the  boy  had  answered. 

Sam  thought  that  his  sister's  indiscretion,  which  had 
brought  her  a  babe  and  a  husband  in  the  same  month  had, 
after  all,  ended  better  than  the  indiscretion  of  his  mother 
in  her  marriage  with  Windy. 

Rousing  himself,  he  went  into  the  house.  A  neighbour 
woman,  employed  for  the  purpose,  had  prepared  the  eve 
ning  meal  and  now  began  complaining  of  his  lateness, 
saying  that  the  food  had  got  cold. 

Sam  ate  in  silence.  While  he  ate  the  woman  went  out 
of  the  house  and  presently  returned,  bringing  a  daughter. 

There  was  in  Caxton  a  code  that  would  not  allow  a 
woman  to  be  alone  in  a  house  with  a  man.  Sam  won 
dered  if  the  bringing  of  the  daughter  was  an  attempt  on 
the  part  of  the  woman  to  abide  by  the  letter  of  the  code, 
if  she  thought  of  the  sick  woman  in  the  house  as  one 
already  gone.  The  thought  amused  and  saddened 
him. 

"You  would  have  thought  her  safe,"  he  mused.  She 
was  fifty,  small,  nervous  and  worn  and  wore  a  set  of 
ill-fitting  false  teeth  that  rattled  as  she  talked.  When 
she  did  not  talk  she  rattled  them  with  her  tongue  because 
of  nervousness. 

In  at  the  kitchen  door  came  Windy,  far  gone  in 
drink.  He  stood  by  the  door  holding  to  the  knob  with 
his  hand  and  trying  to  get  control  of  himself. 

"My  wife — my  wife  is  dying.  She  may  die  any  day/' 
he  wailed,  tears  standing  in  his  eyes. 

The  woman  with  the  daughter  went  into  the  little  par 
lour  where  a  bed  had  been  put  for  the  sick  woman.  Sam 
sat  at  the  kitchen  table  dumb  with  anger  and  disgust  as 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  91 

Windy,  lurching  forward,  fell  into  a  chair  and  began 
sobbing  loudly.  In  the  road  outside  a  man  driving  a 
horse  stopped  and  Sam  could  hear  the  scraping  of  the 
wheels  against  the  buggy  body  as  the  man  turned  in  the 
narrow  street.  Above  the  scraping  of  the  wheels  rose  a 
voice,  swearing  profanely.  The  wind  continued  to  blow 
and  it  had  begun  to  rain. 

"He  has  got  into  the  wrong  street,"  thought  the  boy 
stupidly. 

Windy,  his  head  upon  his  hands,  wept  like  a  broken 
hearted  boy,  his  sobs  echoing  through  the  house,  his 
breath  heavy  with  liquor  tainting  the  air  of  the  room. 
In  a  corner  by  the  stove  the  mother's  ironing  board  stood 
against  the  wall  and  the  sight  of  it  added  fuel  to  the 
anger  smouldering  in  Sam's  heart.  He  remembered  the 
day  when  he  had  stood  in  the  store  doorway  with  his 
mother  and  had  seen  the  dismal  and  amusing  failure  of 
his  father  with  the  bugle,  and  of  the  months  before 
Kate's  wedding,  when  Windy  had  gone  blustering  about 
town  threatening  to  kill  her  lover  and  the  mother  and' 
boy  had  stayed  with  the  girl,  out  of  sight  in  the  house, 
sick  with  humiliation. 

The  drunken  man,  laying  his  head  upon  the  table,  fell 
asleep,  his  snores  replacing  the  sobs  that  had  stirred  the 
boy's  anger.  Sam  began  thinking  again  of  his  mother's 
life. 

The  effort  he  had  made  to  repay  her  for  the  hardness 
of  her  life  now  seemed  utterly  fruitless.  "I  would  like 
to  repay  him,"  he  thought,  shaken  with  a  sudden  spasm 
of  hatred  as  he  looked  at  the  man  before  him.  The 
cheerless  little  kitchen,  the  cold  half-baked  potatoes  and 
sausages  on  the  table,  and  the  drunken  man  asleep,  seemed 
to  him  a  kind  of  symbol  of  the  life  that  had  been  lived 
in  that  house,  and  with  a  shudder  he  turned  his  face 
and  stared  at  the  wall. 

He  thought  of  a  dinner  he  had  once  eaten  at  Freedom 


92  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

Smith's  house.  Freedom  had  brought  the  invitation  into 
the  stables  on  that  night  just  as  to-night  he  had  brought 
the  letter  from  the  Chicago  company,  and  just  as  Sam 
was  shaking  his  head  in  refusal  of  the  invitation  in  at  the 
stable  door  had  come  the  children.  Led  by  the  eldest, 
a  great  tomboy  girl  of  fourteen  with  the  strength  of  a 
man  and  an  inclination  to  burst  out  of  her  clothes  at  un 
expected  places,  they  had  come  charging  into  the  stables 
to  carry  Sam  off  to  the  dinner,  Freedom  laughingly  urg 
ing  them  on,  his  voice  roaring  in  the  stable  so  that  the 
horses  jumped  about  in  their  stalls.  Into  the  house  they 
had  dragged  him,  the  baby,  a  boy  of  four,  sitting  astride 
his  back  and  beating  on  his  head  with  a  woollen  cap,  and 
Freedom  swinging  a  lantern  and  giving  an  occasional 
helpful  push  with  his  hand. 

A  picture  of  the  long  table  covered  with  the  white  cloth 
at  the  end  of  the  big  dining  room  in  Freedom's  house 
came  back  into  the  mind  of  the  boy  now  sitting  in  the 
barren  little  kitchen  before  the  untasted,  badly-cooked 
food.  Upon  it  lay  a  profusion  of  bread  and  meat  and 
great  dishes  heaped  with  steaming  potatoes.  At  his  own 
house  there  had  always  been  just  enough  food  for  the 
single  meal.  The  thing  was  nicely  calculated,  when  you 
had  finished  the  table  was  bare. 

How  he  had  enjoyed  that  dinner  after  the  long  day  on 
the  road.  With  a  flourish  and  a  roar  at  the  children 
Freedom  heaped  high  the  plates  and  passed  them  about, 
the  wife  or  the  tomboy  girl  bringing  unending  fresh  sup 
plies  from  the  kitchen.  The  joy  of  the  evening  with  its 
talk  of  the  children  in  school,  its  sudden  revelation  of 
the  womanliness  of  the  tomboy  girl  and  its  air  of  plenty 
and  good  living  haunted  the  mind  of  the  boy. 

"My  mother  never  knew  anything  like  that,"  he 
thought. 

The  drunken  man  who  had  been  sleeping  aroused  him 
self  and  began  talking  loudly — some  old  forgotten  griev- 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  93 

ance  coming  back  to  his  mind,  he  talked  of  the  cost  of 
school  books. 

"They  change  the  books  in  the  school  too  often,"  he 
declared  in  a  loud  voice,  turning  and  facing  the  kitchen 
stove,  as  though  addressing  an  audience.  "It  is  a  scheme 
to  graft  on  old  soldiers  who  have  children.  I  will  not 
stand  it." 

Sam,  enraged  beyond  speech,  tore  a  leaf  from  a  note 
book  and  scrawled  a  message  upon  it. 

"Be  silent,"  he  wrote.  "If  you  say  another  word  or 
make  another  sound  to  disturb  mother  I  will  choke  you 
and  throw  you  like  a  dead  dog  into  the  street." 

Reaching  across  the  table  and  touching  his  father  on 
the  hand  with  a  fork  taken  from  among  the  dishes,  he 
laid  the  note  upon  the  table  under  the  lamp  before  his 
eyes.  He  was  fighting  with  himself  to  control  a  desire 
to  spring  across  the  room  and  kill  the  man  who  he  be 
lieved  had  brought  his  mother  to  her  death  and  who  now 
sat  bellowing  and  talking  at  her  very  death  bed.  The 
desire  distorted  his  mind  so  that  he  stared  about  the 
kitchen  like  one  seized  with  an  insane  nightmare. 

Windy,  taking  the  note  in  his  hand,  read  it  slowly  and 
then,  not  understanding  its  import  and  but  half  getting 
its  sense,  put  it  in  his  pocket. 

"A  dog  is  dead,  eh?"  he  shouted.  "Well  you're  get 
ting  too  big  and  smart,  lad.  What  do  I  care  for  a  dead 
dog?" 

Sam  did  not  answer.  Rising  cautiously,  he  crept 
around  the  table  and  put  his  hand  upon  the  throat  of  the 
babbling  old  man. 

"I  must  not  kill,"  he  kept  telling  himself  aloud,  as 
though  talking  to  a  stranger.  "I  must  choke  until  he  is 
silent,  but  I  must  not  kill." 

In  the  kitchen  the  two  men  struggled  silently.  Windy, 
unable  to  rise,  struck  out  wildly  and  helplessly  with  his 
feet.  Sam,  looking  down  at  him  and  studying  the  eyes 


94  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

and  the  colour  in  the  cheeks,  realised  with  a  start  that  he 
had  not  for  years  seen  the  face  of  his  father.  How 
vividly  it  stamped  itself  upon  his  mind  now,  and  how 
coarse  and  sodden  it  had  become. 

"I  could  repay  all  of  the  years  mother  has  spent  over 
the  dreary  wash  tub  by  just  one  long,  hard  grip  at  this 
lean  throat.  I  could  kill  him  with  so  little  extra  pres 
sure,"  he  thought. 

The  eyes  began  to  stare  at  him  and  the  tongue  to 
protrude.  Across  the  forehead  ran  a  streak  of  mud 
picked  up  somewhere  in  the  long  afternoon  of  drunken 
carousing. 

"If  I  were  to  press  hard  now  and  kill  him  I  would  see 
his  face  as  it  looks  now  all  the  days  of  my  life,"  thought 
the  boy. 

In  the  silence  of  the  house  he  heard  the  voice  of  the 
neighbour  woman  speaking  sharply  to  her  daughter.  The 
familiar,  dry,  tired  cough  of  the  sick  woman  followed. 
Sam  took  the  unconscious  old  man  in  his  arms  and  went 
carefully  and  silently  out  at  the  kitchen  door.  The  rain 
beat  down  upon  him  and,  as  he  went  around  the  house 
with  his  burden,  the  wind,  shaking  loose  a  dead  branch 
from  a  small  apple  tree  in  the  yard,  blew  it  against  his 
face,  leaving  a  long  smarting  scratch.  At  the  fence  be 
fore  the  house  he  stopped  and  threw  his  burden  down  a 
short  grassy  bank  into  the  road.  Then  turning  he  went, 
bareheaded,  through  the  gate  and  up  the  street. 

"I  will  go  for  Mary  Underwood,"  he  thought,  his  mind 
returning  to  the  friend  who  years  before  had  walked  with 
him  on  country  roads  and  whose  friendship  he  had 
dropped  because  of  John  Telfer's  tirades  against  all 
women.  He  stumbled  along  the  sidewalk,  the  rain  beat 
ing  down  upon  his  bare  head. 

"We  need  a  woman  in  our  house,"  he  kept  saying  over 
and  over  to  himself.  "We  need  a  woman  in  our  house." 


CHAPTER   VII 

LEANING  against  the  wall  under  the  veranda  of  Mary. 
Underwood's  house,  Sam  tried  to  get  in  his  mind  a  re 
membrance  of  what  had  brought  him  there.  He  had 
walked  bareheaded  through  Main  Street  and  out  along 
a  country  road.  Twice  he  had  fallen,  covering  his  clothes 
with  mud.  He  had  forgotten  the  purpose  of  his  walk 
and  had  tramped  on  and  on.  The  unexpected  and  ter 
rible  hatred  of  his  father  that  had  come  upon  him  in 
the  tense  silence  of  the  kitchen  had  so  paralysed  his  brain 
that  he  now  felt  light-headed  and  wonderfully  happy  and 
carefree. 

"I  have  been  doing  something,"  he  thought ;  "I  wonder 
what  it  is." 

The  house  faced  a  grove  of  pine  trees  and  was  reached 
by  climbing  a  little  rise  and  following  a  winding  road 
out  beyond  the  graveyard  and  the  last  of  the  village  lights. 
The  wild  spring  rain  pounded  and  rattled  on  the  tin  roof 
overhead,  and  Sam,  his  back  closely  pressed  against  the 
front  of  the  house,  fought  to  regain  control  of  his 
mind. 

For  an  hour  he  stood  there  staring  into  the  darkness 
and  watched  with  delight  the  progress  of  the  storm.  He 
had — an  inheritance  from  his  mother — a  love  of  thunder 
storms.  He  remembered  a  night  when  he  was  a  boy  and 
his  mother  had  got  out  of  bed  and  gone  here  and  there 
through  the  house  singing.  She  had  sung  softly  so  that 
the  sleeping  father  did  not  hear,  and  in  his  bed  upstairs 
Sam  had  lain  awake  listening  to  the  noises — the  rain  on 
the  roof,  the  occasional  crash  of  thunder,  the  snoring  of 

95 


96  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

Windy,  and  the  unusual  and,  he  thought,  beautiful  sound 
of  the  mother  singing  in  the  storm. 

Now,  lifting  up  his  head,  he  looked  about  with  de 
light.  Trees  in  the  grove  in  front  of  him  bent  and 
tossed  in  the  wind.  The  inky  blackness  of  the  night 
was  relieved  by  the  flickering  oil  lamp  in  the  road  beyond 
the  graveyard  and,  in  the  distance,  by  the  lights  stream 
ing  out  at  the  windows  of  the  houses.  The  light  coming 
out  of  the  house  against  which  he  stood  made  a  little 
cylinder  of  brightness  among  the  pine  trees  through 
which  the  raindrops  fell  gleaming  and  sparkling.  An  oc 
casional  flash  of  lightning  lit  up  the  trees  and  the  wind 
ing  road,  and  the  cannonry  of  the  skies  rolled  and  echoed 
overhead.  A  kind  of  wild  song  sang  in  Sam's  heart. 

"I  wish  it  would  last  all  night,"  he  thought,  his  mind 
fixed  on  the  singing  of  his  mother  in  the  dark  house 
when  he  was  a  boy. 

The  door  opened  and  a  woman  stepped  out  upon  the 
veranda  and  stood  before  him  facing  the  storm,  the  wind 
tossing  the  soft  kimono  in  which  she  was  clad  and  the 
rain  wetting  her  face.  Under  the  tin  roof,  the  air  was 
filled  with  the  rattling  reverberation  of  the  rain.  The 
woman  lifted  her  head  and,  with  the  rain  beating  down 
upon  her,  began  singing,  her  fine  contralto  voice  rising 
above  the  rattle  of  the  rain  on  the  roof  and  going  on 
uninterrupted  by  the  crash  of  the  thunder.  She  sang  of 
a  lover  riding  through  the  storm  to  his  mistress.  One 
refrain  persisted  in  the  song — 

"He  rode  and  he  thought  of  her  red,  red  lips," 

sang  the  woman,  putting  her  hand  upon  the  railing  of 
the  little  porch  and  leaning  forward  into  the  storm. 

Sam  was  amazed.  The  woman  standing  before  him 
was  Mary  Underwood,  who  had  been  his  friend  when 
he  was  a  boy  in  school  and  toward  whom  his  mind  had 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  97 

turned  after  the  tragedy  in  the  kitchen.  The  figure  of 
the  woman  standing  singing  before  him  became  a  part 
of  his  thoughts  of  his  mother  singing  on  the  stormy  night 
in  the  house  and  his  mind  wandered  on,  seeing  pictures 
as  he  used  to  see  them  when  a  boy  walking  under  the 
stars  and  listening  to  the  talk  of  John  Telfer.  He  saw 
a  broad-shouldered  man  shouting  defiance  to  the  storm 
as  he  rode  down  a  mountain  path. 

"And  he  laughed  at  the  rain  on  his  wet,  wet  cloak," 
went  on  the  voice  of  the  singer. 

Mary  Underwood's  singing  there  in  the  rain  made  her 
seem  near  and  likeable  as  she  had  seemed  to  him  when 
he  was  a  barefoot  boy. 

"John  Telfer  was  wrong  about  her/'  he  thought. 

She  turned  and  faced  him.  Tiny  streams  of  water 
ran  from  her  hair  down  across  her  cheeks.  A  flash  of 
lightning  cut  the  darkness,  illuminating  the  spot  where 
Sam,  now  a  broad-shouldered  man,  stood  with  the  mud 
upon  his  clothes  and  the  bewildered  look  upon  his  face. 
A  sharp  exclamation  of  surprise  broke  from  her  lips : 

"Hello,  Sam !  What  are  you  doing  here  ?  You  had 
better  get  in  out  of  the  rain." 

"I  like  it  here,"  replied  Sam,  lifting  his  head  and  look 
ing  past  her  at  the  storm. 

Walking  to  the  door  and  standing  with  her  hand  upon 
the  knob,  Mary  looked  into  the  darkness. 

"You  have  been  a  long  time  coming  to  see  me,"  she 
said,  "come  in." 

Within  the  house,  with  the  door  closed,  the  rattle  of 
the  rain  on  the  veranda  roof  sank  to  a  subdued,  quiet 
drumming.  Piles  of  books  lay  upon  a  table  in  the  centre 
of  the  room  and  there  were  other  books  on  the  shelves 
along  the  walls.  On  a  table  burned  a  student's  lamp  and 
in  the  corners  of  the  room  lay  heavy  shadows. 

Sam  stood  by  the  wall  near  the  door  looking  about 
with  half-seeing  eyes. 


98  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

Mary,  who  had  gone  to  another  part  of  the  house  and 
who  now  returned  clad  in  a  long  cloak,  looked  at  him 
with  quick  curiosity,  and  began  moving  about  the  room 
picking  up  odds  and  ends  of  woman's  clothing  scat 
tered  on  the  chairs.  Kneeling,  she  lighted  a  fire  under 
some  sticks  piled  in  an  open  grate  at  the  side  of  the 
room. 

"It  was  the  storm  made  me  want  to  sing,"  she  said 
self-consciously,  and  then  briskly,  "we  shall  have  to  be 
drying  you  out;  you  have  fallen  in  the  road  and  got 
yourself  covered  with  mud." 

From  being  morose  and  silent  Sam  became  talkative. 
An  idea  had  come  into  his  mind. 

"I  have  come  here  courting,"  he  thought;  "I  have 
come  to  ask  Mary  Underwood  to  be  my  wife  and  live  in 
my  house." 

The  woman,  kneeling  by  the  blazing  sticks,  made  a  pic 
ture  that  aroused  something  that  had  been  sleeping  in 
him.  The  heavy  cloak  she  wore,  falling  away,  showed  the 
round  little  shoulders  imperfectly  covered  by  the  kimono, 
wet  and  clinging  to  them.  The  slender,  youthful  figure, 
the  soft  grey  hair  and  the  serious  little  face,  lit  by  the 
burning  sticks  caused  a  jumping  of  his  heart. 

"We  are  needing  a  woman  in  our  house,"  he  said  heav 
ily,  repeating  the  words  that  had  been  on  his  lips  as  he 
stumbled  through  the  storm-swept  streets  and  along  the 
mud-covered  roads.  "We  are  needing  a  woman  in  our 
house,  and  I  have  come  to  take  you  there. 

"I  intend  to  marry  you,"  he  added,  lurching  across 
the  room  and  grasping  her  roughly  by  the  shoulders. 
"Why  not?  I  am  needing  a  woman." 

Mary  Underwood  was  dismayed  and  frightened  by  the 
face  looking  down  at  her,  and  by  the  strong  hands 
clenched  upon  her  shoulders.  In  his  youth  she  had  con 
ceived  a  kind  of  maternal  passion  for  the  newsboy  and 
had  planned  a  future  for  him.  Her  plans  if  followed 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  99 

would  have  made  him  a  scholar,  a  man  living  his  life 
among  books  and  ideas.  Instead,  he  had  chosen  to  live 
his  life  among  men,  to  be  a  money-maker,  to  drive  about 
the  country  like  Freedom  Smith,  making  deals  with  farm 
ers.  She  had  seen  him  driving  at  evening  through  the 
street  to  Freedom's  house,  going  in  and  out  of  Wild- 
man's,  and  walking  through  the  streets  with  men.  In 
a  dim  way  she  knew  that  an  influence  had  been  at  work 
upon  him  to  win  him  from  the  things  of  which  she  had 
dreamed  and  she  had  secretly  blamed  John  Telfer,  the 
talking,  laughing  idler.  Now,  out  of  the  storm,  the  boy 
had  come  back  to  her,  his  hands  and  his  clothes  covered 
with  the  mud  of  the  road,  and  talked  to  her,  a  woman 
old  enough  to  be  his  mother,  of  marriage  and  of  coming 
to  live  with  him  in  his  house.  She  stood,  chilled,  looking 
into  the  eager,  strong  face  and  the  eyes  with  the  pained 
dazed  look  in  them. 

Under  her  gaze,  something  of  the  old  feeling  of  the 
boy  came  back  to  Sam,  and  he  began  vaguely  trying  to 
tell  her  of  it. 

"It  was  not  the  talk  of  Telfer  drove  me  from  you/' 
he  began,  "it  was  because  you  talked  so  much  of  the 
schools  and  of  books.  I  was  tired  of  them.  I  could  not 
go  on  year  after  year  sitting  in  a  stuffy  little  schoolroom 
when  there  was  so  much  money  to  be  made  in  the  world. 
I  grew  tired  of  the  school  teachers,  drumming  with  their 
fingers  on  the  desks  and  looking  out  at  the  windows  at 
men  passing  in  the  street.  I  wanted  to  get  out  of  there 
and  into  the  streets  myself." 

Dropping  his  hands  from  her  shoulders,  he  sat  down 
in  a  chair  and  stared  into  the  fire,  now  blazing  steadily. 
Steam  began  to  rise  from  his  trousers  legs.  His  mind, 
still  working  beyond  his  control,  began  to  reconstruct  an 
old  boyhood  fancy,  half  his  own,  half  John  Telfer's, 
that  had  years  before  come  into  his  mind.  It  concerned 
a  picture  he  and  Telfer  had  made  of  the  ideal  scholar. 


ioo          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

The  picture  had,  as  its  central  figure,  a  stooped-shoul- 
dered,  feeble  old  man  stumbling  along  the  street,  mutter 
ing  to  himself  and  poking  in  a  gutter  with  a  stick.  The 
picture  was  a  caricature  of  puttering  old  Frank  Huntley, 
superintendent  of  the  Caxton  schools. 

Sitting  before  the  fire  in  Mary  Underwood's  house, 
become,  for  the  moment,  a  boy,  facing  a  boy's  problems, 
Sam  did  not  want  to  be  such  a  man.  He  wanted 
only  that  in  scholarship  which  would  help  him  to  be  the 
kind  of  man  he  was  bent  on  being,  a  man  of  the  world 
doing  the  work  of  the  world  and  making  money  by  his 
work.  Things  he  had  been  unable  to  get  expressed  when 
he  was  a  boy  and  her  friend,  coming  again  into  his  mind, 
he  felt  that  he  must  here  and  now  make  it  plain  to 
Mary  Underwood  that  the  schools  were  not  giving  him 
what  he  wanted.  His  brain  worked  on  the  problem  of 
how  to  tell  her  about  it. 

Turning,  he  looked  at  her  and  said  earnestly :  "I  am 
going  to  quit  the  schools.  It  is  not  your  fault,  but  I 
am  going  to  quit  just  the  same/' 

Mary,  who  had  been  looking  down  at  the  great  mud- 
covered  figure  in  the  chair  began  to  understand.  A  light 
came  into  her  eyes.  Going  to  the  door  opening  into  a 
stairway  leading  to  sleeping  rooms  above,  she  called 
sharply,  "Auntie,  come  down  here  at  once.  There  is  a 
sick  man  here." 

A  startled,  trembling  voice  answered  from  above, 
"Who  is  it?" 

Mary  Underwood  did  not  answer.  She  came  back  to 
Sam  and,  putting  her  hand  gently  on  his  shoulder, 
said,  "It  is  your  mother  and  you  are  only  a  sick,  half- 
crazed  boy  after  all.  Is  she  dead?  Tell  me  about  it." 

Sam  shook  his  head.  "She  is  still  there  in  the  bed, 
coughing."  He  roused  himself  and  stood  up.  "I  have 
just  killed  my  father,"  he  announced.  "I  choked  him 
and  threw  him  down  the  bank  into  the  road  in  front  of 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  101 

the  house.     He  made  horrible  noises  in  the  kitchen  and 
mother  was  tired  and  wanted  to  sleep." 

Mary  Underwood  began  running  about  the  room. 
From  a  little  alcove  under  a  stairway  she  took  clothes, 
throwing  them  upon  the  floor  about  the  room.  She 
pulled  on  a  stocking  and,  unconscious  of  Sam's  presence,' 
raised  her  skirts  and  fastened  it.  Then,  putting  one  shoe 
on  the  stockinged  foot  and  the  other  on  the  bare  one, 
she  turned  to  him.  "We  will  go  back  to  your  house. 
I  think  you  are  right.  You  need  a  woman  there." 

In  the  street  she  walked  rapidly  along,  clinging  to  the 
arm  of  the  tall  fellow  who  strode  silently  beside  her.  A 
cheerfulness  had  come  over  Sam.  He  felt  he  had  ac 
complished  something — something  he  had  set  out  to  ac 
complish.  He  again  thought  of  his  mother  and  drifting 
into  the  notion  that  he  was  on  his  way  home  from  work 
at  Freedom  Smith's,  began  planning  the  evening  he  would 
spend  with  her. 

"I  will  tell  her  of  the  letter  from  the  Chicago  company 
and  of  what  I  will  do  when  I  go  to  the  city,"  he  thought. 

At  the  gate  before  the  McPherson  house  Mary  looked 
into  the  road  below  the  grassy  bank  that  ran  down  from 
the  fence,  but  in  the  darkness  she  could  see  nothing.  The 
rain  continued  to  fall  and  the  wind  screamed  and  shouted 
as  it  rushed  through  the  bare  branches  of  the  trees.  Sam 
went  through  the  gate  and  around  the  house  to  the  kitchen 
door  intent  upon  getting  to  his  mother's  bedside. 

In  the  house  the  neighbour  woman  sat  asleep  in  a  chair 
before  the  kitchen  stove.  The  daughter  had  gone. 

Sam  went  through  the  house  to  the  parlour  and  sat 
down  in  a  chair  beside  his  mother's  bed,  picking  up  her 
hand  and  holding  it  in  his  own.  "She  must  be  asleep," 
he  thought. 

At  the  kitchen  door  Mary  Underwood  stopped,  and, 
turning,  ran  away  into  the  darkness  along  the  street.  By 
the  kitchen  fire  the  neighbour  woman  still  slept.  In  the 


102          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

parlour  Sam,  sitting  on  the  chair  beside  his  mother's  bed, 
looked  about  him.  A  lamp  burned  dimly  upon  the  little 
stand  beside  the  bed  and  the  light  of  it  fell  upon  the  por 
trait  of  a  tall,  aristocratic-looking  woman  with  rings  on 
her  fingers,  that  hung  upon  the  wall.  The  picture  be 
longed  to  Windy  and  was  claimed  by  him  as  a  portrait  of 
his  mother,  and  it  had  once  brought  on  a  quarrel  between 
Sam  and  his  sister. 

Kate  had  taken  the  portrait  of  the  lady  seriously,  and 
the  boy  had  come  upon  her  sitting  in  a  chair  before  it, 
her  hair  rearranged  and  her  hands  lying  in  her  lap  in 
imitation  of  the  pose  maintained  so  haughtily  by  the  great 
lady  who  looked  down  at  her. 

"It  is  a  fraud,"  he  had  declared,  irritated  by  what  he  be 
lieved  his  sister's  devotion  to  one  of  the  father's  preten 
sions.  "It  is  a  fraud  he  has  picked  up  somewhere  and 
now  claims  as  his  mother  to  make  people  believe  he  is 
something  big." 

The  girl,  ashamed  at  having  been  caught  in  the  pose, 
and  furious  because  of  the  attack  upon  the  authenticity 
of  the  portrait,  had  gone  into  a  spasm  of  indignation, 
putting  her  hands  to  her  ears  and  stamping  on  the 
floor  with  her  foot.  Then  she  had  run  across  the  room 
and  dropped  upon  her  knees  before  a  little  couch,  buried 
her  face  in  a  pillow  and  shook  with  anger  and  grief. 

Sam  had  turned  and  walked  out  of  the  room.  The 
emotions  of  the  sister  had  seemed  to  him  to  have  the 
flavour  of  one  of  Windy's  outbreaks. 

"She  likes  it,"  he  had  thought,  dismissing  the  inci 
dent.  "She  likes  believing  in  lies.  She  is  like  Windy 
and  would  rather  believe  in  them  than  not." 

Mary  Underwood  ran  through  the  rain  to  John  Tel- 
fer's  house  and  beat  on  the  door  with  her  fist  until 
Telfer,  followed  by  Eleanor,  holding  a  lamp  above  her 
head,  appeared  at  the  door.  With  Telfer  she  went  back 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  103 

through  the  streets  to  the  front  of  Sam's  house  thinking 
of  the  terrible  choked  and  disfigured  man  they  should 
find  there.  She  went  along  clinging  to  Telfer's  arm  as 
she  had  clung  to  Sam's,  unconscious  of  her  bare  head  and 
scanty  attire.  In  his  hand  Telfer  carried  a  lantern  se 
cured  from  the  stable. 

In  the  road  before  the  house  they  found  nothing.  Tel 
fer  went  up  and  down  swinging  the  lantern  and  peering 
into  gutters.  The  woman  walked  beside  him,  her  skirts 
lifted  and  the  mud  splashing  upon  her  bare  leg. 

Suddenly  Telfer  threw  back  his  head  and  laughed. 
Taking  her  hand  he  led  Mary  with  a  rush  up  the  bank 
and  through  the  gate. 

"What  a  muddle-headed  old  fool  I  am!"  he  cried.  "I 
am  getting  old  and  addle-pated!  Windy  McPherson  is 
not  dead!  Nothing  could  kill  that  old  war  horse!  He 
was  in  at  Wildman's  grocery  after  nine  o'clock  to-night 
covered  with  mud  and  swearing  he  had  been  in  a  fight 
with  Art  Sherman.  Poor  Sam  and  you — to  have  come 
to  me  and  to  have  found  me  a  stupid  ass !  Fool !  Fool ! 
What  a  fool  I  have  become !" 

In  at  the  kitchen  door  ran  Mary  and  Telfer,  frighten 
ing  the  woman  by  the  stove  so  that  she  sprang  to  her 
feet  and  began  nervously  making  the  false  teeth  rattle 
with  her  tongue.  In  the  parlour  they  found  Sam,  his 
head  upon  the  edge  of  the  bed,  asleep.  In  his  hand  he 
held  the  cold  hand  of  Jane  McPherson.  She  had  been 
dead  for  an  hour.  Mary  Underwood  stooped  over  and 
kissed  his  wet  hair  as  the  neighbour  woman  came  in  at 
the  doorway  bearing  the  kitchen  lamp,  and  John  Telfer, 
holding  his  finger  to  his  lips,  commanded  silence. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

THE  funeral  of  Jane  McPherson  was  a  trying  affair 
for  her  son.  He  thought  that  his  sister  Kate,  with  the 
babe  in  her  arms,  had  become  coarsened — she  looked 
frumpish  and,  while  they  were  in  the  house,  had  an  air 
of  having  quarrelled  with  her  husband  when  they  came 
out  of  their  bedroom  in  the  morning.  During  the  funeral 
service  Sam  sat  in  the  parlour,  astonished  and  irritated 
by  the  endless  number  of  women  that  crowded  into  the 
house.  They  were  everywhere,  in  the  kitchen,  the  sleep 
ing  room  back  of  the  parlour;  and  in  the  parlour,  where 
the  dead  woman  lay  in  her  coffin,  they  were  massed. 
When  the  thin-lipped  minister,  holding  a  book  in  his 
hand,  held  forth  upon  the  virtues  of  the  dead  woman, 
they  wept.  Sam  looked  at  the  floor  and  thought  that 
thus  they  would  have  wept  over  the  body  of  the  dead 
Windy,  had  his  fingers  but  tightened  a  trifle.  He  won 
dered  if  the  minister  would  have  talked  in  the  same  way 
— blatantly  and  without  knowledge — of  the  virtues  of  the 
dead.  In  a  chair  at  the  side  of  the  coffin  the  bereaved 
husband,  in  new  black  clothes,  wept  audibly.  The  bald- 
headed,  officious  undertaker  kept  moving  nervously  about, 
intent  upon  the  ritual  of  his  trade. 

During  the  service,  a  man  sitting  behind  him  dropped 
a  note  on  the  floor  at  Sam's  feet.  Sam  picked  it  up  and 
read  it,  glad  of  something  to  distract  his  attention  from 
the  voice  of  the  minister,  and  the  faces  of  the  weeping 
women,  none  of  whom  had  before  been  in  the  house  and 
all  of  whom  he  thought  strikingly  lacking  in  a  sense  of 

104 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  105 

the  sacredness  of  privacy.     The  note  was  from  John 
Telfer. 

"I  will  not  come  to  your  mother's  funeral,"  he  wrote. 
"I  respected  your  mother  while  she  lived  and  I  will  leave 
you  alone  with  her  now  that  she  is  dead.  In  her  memory 
I  will  hold  a  ceremony  in  my  heart.  If  I  am  in  Wild- 
man's,  I  may  ask  the  man  to  quit  selling  soap  and  to 
bacco  for  the  moment  and  to  close  and  lock  the  door. 
If  I  am  at  Valmore's  shop,  I  will  go  up  into  his  loft  and 
listen  to  him  pounding  on  the  anvil  below.  If  he  or  Free 
dom  Smith  go  to  your  house,  I  warn  them  I  will  cut 
their  friendship.  When  I  see  the  carriages  going  through 
the  street  and  know  that  the  thing  is  right  well  done 
and  over,  I  will  buy  some  flowers  and  take  them  to  Mary 
Underwood  as  an  appreciation  of  the  living  in  the  name 
of  the  dead." 

The  note  cheered  and  comforted  Sam.  It  gave  him 
back  a  grip  of  something  that  had  slipped  from  him.' 

"It  is  good  sense,  after  all,"  he  thought,  and  realised 
that  even  in  the  days  when  he  was  being  made  to  suf 
fer  horrors,  and  in  the  face  of  the  fact  that  Jane 
McPherson's  long  hard  role  was  just  being  played  out: 
to  the  end,  the  farmer  in  the  field  was  sowing  his  corn, 
Valmore  was  beating  upon  his  anvil,  and  John  Telfer  was 
writing  notes  with  a  flourish.  He  arose,  interrupting  the 
minister's  discourse.  Mary  Underwood  had  come  in  just 
as  the  minister  began  talking  and  had  dropped  into  an 
obscure  corner  near  the  door  leading  into  the  street.  Sam 
crowded  past  the  women  who  stared  and  the  minister  who 
frowned  and  the  baldheaded  undertaker  who  wrung  his 
hands  and,  dropping  the  note  into  her  lap,  said,  oblivious 
of  the  people  looking  and  listening  with  breathless  curi 
osity,  "It  is  from  John  Telfer.  Read  it.  Even  he,  hating 
women  as  he  did,  is  now  bringing  flowers  to  your  door." 

In  the  room  a  wind  of  whispered  comments  sprang  up. 
Women,  putting  their  heads  together  and  their  hands 


106          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

before  their  faces,  nodded  toward  the  school  teacher, 
and  the  boy,  unconscious  of  the  sensation  he  had  created, 
went  back  to  his  chair  and  looked  again  at  the  floor,  wait 
ing  until  the  talk  and  the  singing  of  songs  and  the  parad 
ing  through  the  streets  should  be  ended.  Again  the  min 
ister  began  reading  from  the  book. 

"I  have  become  older  than  all  of  these  people  here," 
thought  the  youth.  "They  play  at  life  and  death,  and 
I  have  felt  it  between  the  fingers  of  my  hand." 

Mary  Underwood,  lacking  Sam's  unconsciousness  of 
the  people,  looked  about  with  burning  cheeks.  Seeing 
the  women  whispering  and  putting  their  heads  together, 
a  chill  of  fear  ran  through  her.  Into  the  room  had  been 
thrust  the  face  of  an  old  enemy  to  her — the  scandal  of  a 
small  town.  Picking  up  the  note  she  slipped  out  at  the 
door  and  stole  away  along  the  street.  The  old  maternal 
love  for  Sam  had  returned  strengthened  and  ennobled 
by  the  terror  through  which  she  had  passed  with  him 
that  night  in  the  rain.  Going  to  her  house  she  whistled 
the  Collie  dog  and  set  out  along  a  country  road.  At  the 
edge  of  a  grove  of  trees  she  stopped,  sat  down  on  a  log, 
and  read  Telfer's  note.  From  the  soft  ground  into  which 
her  feet  sank  there  came  the  warm  pungent  smell  of  the 
new  growth.  Tears  came  into  her  eyes.  She  thought 
that  in  a  few  days  much  had  come  to  her.  She  had  got 
a  boy  upon  whom  she  could  pour  out  the  mother  love 
in  her  heart,  and  she  had  made  a  friend  of  Telfer,  whom 
she  had  long  regarded  with  fear  and  doubt. 

For  a  month  Sam  lingered  in  Caxton.  It  seemed  to 
him  there  was  something  that  wanted  doing  there.  He 
sat  with  the  men  at  the  back  of  Wildman's,  and  walked 
aimlessly  through  the  streets  and  out  of  the  town  along 
the  country  roads,  where  men  worked  all  day  in  the  fields 
behind  sweating  horses,  ploughing  the  land.  The  thrill  of 
spring  was  in  the  air,  and  in  the  evening  a  song  sparrow 
sang  in  the  apple  tree  below  his  bedroom  window.  Sam 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  107 

walked  and  loitered  in  silence,  looking  at  the  ground.  In 
his  mind  was  the  dread  of  people.  The  talk  of  the  men 
in  the  store  wearied  him  and  when  he  went  alone  into 
the  country  he  found  himself  accompanied  by  the  voices 
of  all  of  those  he  had  come  out  of  town  to  escape.  On 
the  street  corner  the  thin-lipped,  brown-bearded  minister 
stopped  him  and  talked  of  the  future  life  as  he  had 
stopped  and  talked  to  a  bare-legged  newsboy. 

"Your  mother,"  he  said,  "has  but  gone  before.  It  is 
for  you  to  get  into  the  narrow  path  and  follow  her. 
God  has  sent  this  sorrow  as  a  warning  to  you.  He  wants 
you  also  to  get  into  the  way  of  life  and  in  the  end  to 
join  her.  Begin  coming  to  our  church.  Join  in  the 
work  of  the  Christ.  Find  truth." 

Sam,  who  had  listened  without  hearing,  shook  his  head 
and  went  on.  The  minister's  talk  seemed  no  more  than 
a  meaningless  jumble  of  words  out  of  which  he  got  but 
one  thought. 

"Find  truth,"  he  repeated  to  himself  after  the  minis 
ter,  and  let  his  mind  play  with  the  idea.  "The  best  men 
are  all  trying  to  do  that.  They  spend  their  lives  at  the 
task.  They  are  all  trying  to  find  truth." 

He  went  along  the  street,  pleased  with  himself  because 
of  the  interpretation  he  had  put  upon  the  minister's 
words.  The  terrible  moments  in  the  kitchen  followed  by 
his  mother's  death  had  put  a  new  look  of  seriousness  into 
his  face  and  he  felt  within  him  a  new  sense  of  responsi 
bility  to  the  dead  woman  and  to  himself.  Men  stopped 
him  on  the  street  and  wished  him  well  in  the  city.  News 
of  his  leaving  had  become  public.  Things  in  which  Free 
dom  Smith  was  concerned  were  always  public  affairs. 

"He  would  take  a  drum  with  him  to  make  love  to  a 
neighbour's  wife,"  said  John  Telfer. 

Sam  felt  that  in  a  way  he  was  a  child  of  Caxton. 
Early  it  had  taken  him  to  its  bosom;  it  had  made  of 
him  a  semi-public  character ;  it  had  encouraged  him  in  his 


io8          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

money-making,  humiliated  him  through  his  father,  and 
patronised  him  lovingly  because  of  his  toiling  mother. 
When  he  was  a  boy,  scurrying  between  the  legs  of  the 
drunkards  in  Piety  Hollow  of  a  Saturday  night,  there 
was  always  some  one  to  speak  a  word  to  him  of  his  morals 
and  to  shout  at  him  a  cheering  word  of  advice.  Had  he 
elected  to  remain  there,  with  the  thirty-five  hundred  dol 
lars  already  in  the  Savings  Bank — built  to  that  during  his 
years  with  Freedom  Smith — he  might  soon  become  one 
of  the  town's  solid  men. 

He  did  not  want  to  stay.  He  felt  that  his  call  was 
in  another  place  and  that  he  would  go  there  gladly. 
He  wondered  why  he  did  not  get  on  the  train  and  be 
off. 

One  night  when  he  had  been  late  on  the  road,  loiter 
ing  by  fences,  hearing  the  lonely  barking  of  dogs  at  dis 
tant  farmhouses,  getting  the  smell  of  the  new-ploughed 
ground  into  his  nostrils,  he  came  into  town  and  sat 
down  on  a  low  iron  fence  that  ran  along  by  the  platform 
of  the  railroad  station,  to  wait  for  the  midnight  train 
north.  Trains  had  taken  on  a  new  meaning  to  him  since 
any  day  might  see  him  on  such  a  train  bound  into  his 
new  life. 

A  man,  with  two  bags  in  his  hands,  came  on  the 
station  platform  followed  by  two  women. 

"Here,  watch  these,"  he  said  to  the  women,  setting 
the  bags  upon  the  platform ;  "I  will  go  for  the  tickets/' 
and  disappeared  into  the  darkness. 

The  two  women  resumed  their  interrupted  talk. 

"Ed's  wife  has  been  poorly  these  ten  years/'  said  one 
of  them.  "It  will  be  better  for  her  and  for  Ed  now  that 
she  is  dead,  but  I  dread  the  long  ride.  I  wish  she  had 
died  when  I  was  in  Ohio  two  years  ago.  I  am  sure  to  be 
train-sick." 

Sam,  sitting  in  the  darkness,  was  thinking  of  a  part  of 
one  of  John  Telfer's  old  talks  with  him. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  109 

"They  are  good  people  but  they  are  not  your  people. 
You  will  go  away  from  here.  You  will  be  a  big  man 
of  dollars,  it  is  plain." 

He  began  listening  idly  to  the  two  women.  The  man 
had  a  shop  for  mending  shoes  on  a  side  street  back  of 
Geiger's  drug  store  and  the  two  women,  one  short  and 
round,  one  long  and  thin,  kept  a  small  dingy  millinery 
shop  and  were  Eleanor  Telfer's  only  competitors. 

"Well,  the  town  knows  her  now  for  what  she  is,"  said 
the  tall  woman.  "Milly  Peters  says  she  won't  rest  until 
she  has  put  that  stuck-up  Mary  Underwood  in  her  place. 
Her  mother  worked  in  the  McPherson  house  and  it  was 
her  told  Milly.  I  never  heard  such  a  story.  To  think 
of  Jane  McPherson  working  all  these  years  and  then 
having  such  goings-on  in  her  house  when  she  lay  dying. 
Milly  says  that  Sam  went  away  early  in  the  evening  and 
came  home  late  with  that  Underwood  thing,  half  dressed, 
hanging  on  his  arm.  Milly's  mother  looked  out  of  the 
window  and  saw  them.  Then  she  ran  out  by  the  kitchen 
stove  and  pretended  to  be  asleep.  She  wanted  to  see 
what  was  up.  And  the  bold  hussy  came  right  into  the 
house  with  Sam.  Then  she  went  away,  and  after  a  while 
back  she  came  with  that  John  Telfer.  Milly  is  going  to 
see  that  Eleanor  Telfer  finds  it  out.  I  guess  it  will  bring 
her  down,  too.  And  there  is  no  telling  how  many  other 
men  in  this  town  Mary  Underwood  is  running  with. 
Milly  says " 

The  two  women  turned  as  out  of  the  darkness  came  a 
tall  figure  roaring  and  swearing.  Two  hands  flashed  out 
and  sank  into  their  hair. 

"Stop  it!"  growled  Sam,  beating  the  two  heads  to 
gether,  "stop  your  dirty  lies! — you  ugly  she-beasts!" 

Hearing  the  two  women  screaming  the  man  who  had 
g-one  for  the  railroad  tickets  came  running  down  the  sta 
tion  platform  followed  by  Jerry  Donlin.  Springing  for 
ward  Sam  knocked  the  shoemaker  over  the  iron  fence 


no          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

into  a  newly  spaded  flower  bed  and  then  turned  to  the 
baggage  man. 

"They  were  telling  lies  about  Mary  Underwood,"  he 
shouted.  "She  tried  to  save  me  from  killing  my  father 
and  now  they  are  telling  lies  about  her." 

The  two  women  picked  up  the  bags  and  ran  whimper 
ing  away  along  the  station  platform.  Jerry  Donlin 
climbed  over  the  iron  fence  and  confronted  the  sur 
prised  and  frightened  shoemaker. 

"What  the  Hell  are  you  doing  in  my  flower  bed  ?"  he 
growled. 

Hurrying  through  the  streets  Sam's  mind  was  in  a 
ferment.  Like  the  Roman  emperor  he  wished  that  all 
the  world  had  but  one  head  that  he  might  cut  it  off  with 
a  slash.  The  town  that  had  seemed  so  paternal,  so  cheery, 
so  intent  upon  wishing  him  well,  now  seemed  horrible. 
He  thought  of  it  as  a  great,  crawling,  slimy  thing  lying 
in  wait  amid  the  cornfields. 

"To  be  saying  that  of  her,  of  that  white  soul !"  he  ex 
claimed  aloud  in  the  empty  street,  all  of  his  boyish  loyalty 
and  devotion  to  the  woman  who  had  put  out  a  hand  to 
him  in  his  hour  of  trouble  aroused  and  burning  in  him. 

He  wished  that  he  might  meet  another  man  and  could 
hit  him  also  a  swinging  blow  on  the  nose  as  he  had 
hit  the  amazed  shoemaker.  He  went  to  his  own  house 
and,  leaning  on  the  gate,  stood  looking  at  it  and  swear 
ing  meaninglessly.  Then,  turning,  he  went  again  through 
the  deserted  streets  past  the  railroad  station  where,  the 
midnight  train  having  come  and  gone  and  Jerry  Donlin 
having  gone  home  for  the  night,  all  was  dark  and  quiet. 
He  was  filled  with  horror  of  what  Mary  Underwood  had 
seen  at  Jane  McPherson's  funeral. 

"It  is  better  to  be  utterly  bad  than  to  speak  ill  of  an 
other,"  he  thought. 

For  the  first  time  he  realised  another  side  of  village 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          in 

life.  In  fancy  he  saw  going  past  him  on  the  dark  road 
a  long  file  of  women,  women  with  coarse  unlighted  faces 
and  dead  eyes.  Many  of  the  faces  he  knew.  They  were  the 
faces  of  Caxton  wives  at  whose  houses  he  had  delivered 
papers.  He  remembered  how  eagerly  they  had  run  out 
of  their  houses  to  get  the  papers  and  how  they  hung  day 
after  day  over  the  details  of  sensational  murder  cases. 
Once,  when  a  Chicago  girl  had  been  murdered  in  a  dive 
and  the  details  were  unusually  revolting,  two  women,  un 
able  to  restrain  their  curiosity,  had  come  to  the  station 
to  wait  for  the  train  bringing  the  newspapers  and  Sam 
had  heard  them  rolling  the  horrid  mess  over  and  over  on 
their  tongues. 

In  every  city  and  in  every  village  there  is  a  class  of 
women,  the  thought  of  whom  paralyses  the  mind.  They 
live  their  lives  in  small,  unaired,  unsanitary  houses,  and 
go  on  year  after  year  washing  dishes  and  clothes — only 
their  fingers  occupied.  They  read  no  good  books,  think 
no  clean  thoughts,  are  made  love  to  as  John  Telfer  had 
said,  with  kisses  in  a  darkened  room  by  a  shame- faced 
yokel  and,  after  marrying  some  such  a  yokel,  live  lives  of 
unspeakable  blankness.  Into  the  houses  of  these  women 
come  the  husbands  at  evening,  tired  and  uncommunica 
tive,  to  eat  hurriedly  and  then  go  again  into  the  streets  or, 
the  blessing  of  utter  physical  exhaustion  having  come  to 
them,  to  sit  for  an  hour  in  stockinged  feet  before  crawl 
ing  away  to  sleep  and  oblivion. 

In  these  women  is  no  light,  no  vision.  They  have  in 
stead  certain  fixed  ideas  to  which  they  cling  with  a  per 
sistency  touching  heroism.  To  the  man  they  have 
snatched  from  society  they  cling  also  with  a  tenacity  to 
be  measured  only  by  their  love  of  a  roof  over  their  heads 
and  the  craving  for  food  to  put  into  their  stomachs.  Be 
ing  mothers,  they  are  the  despair  of  reformers,  the 
shadow  on  the  vision  of  dreamers  and  they  put  the  black 
dread  upon  the  heart  of  the  poet  who  cries,  "The  female 


ii2          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

of  the  species  is  more  deadly  than  the  male."  At  their 
worst  they  are  to  be  seen  drunk  with  emotion  amid 
the  lurid  horrors  of  a  French  Revolution  or  im 
mersed  in  the  secret  whispering,  creeping  terror 
of  a  religious  persecution.  At  their  best  they 
are  mothers  of  half  mankind.  Wealth  coming 
to  them,  they  throw  themselves  into  garish  display  of  it 
and  flash  upon  the  sight  of  Newport  or  Palm  Beach. 
In  their  native  lair  in  the  close  little  houses,  they  sleep  in 
the  bed  of  the  man  who  has  put  clothes  upon  their  backs 
and  food  into  their  mouths  because  that  is  the  usage  of 
their  kind  and  give  him  of  their  bodies  grudgingly  or 
willingly  as  the  laws  of  their  physical  needs  direct.  They 
do  not  love,  they  sell,  instead,  their  bodies  in  the  market 
place  and  cry  out  that  man  shall  witness  their  virtue  be 
cause  they  have  had  the  joy  of  finding  one  buyer  instead 
of  the  many  of  the  red  sisterhood.  A  fierce  animalism 
in  them  makes  them  cling  to  the  babe  at  their  breast  and 
in  the  days  of  its  softness  and  loveliness  they  close  their 
eyes  and  try  to  catch  again  an  old  fleeting  dream  of  their 
girlhood,  a  something  vague,  shadowy,  no  longer  a  part 
of  them,  brought  with  the  babe  out  of  the  infinite.  Hav 
ing  passed  beyond  the  land  of  dreams,  they  dwell  in  the 
land  of  emotions  and  weep  over  the  bodies  of  unknown 
dead  or  sit  under  the  eloquence  of  evangelists,  shouting 
of  heaven  and  of  hell — the  call  to  the  one  being  brother 
to  the  call  of  the  other — crying  upon  the  troubled  air  of 
hot  little  churches,  where  hope  is  fighting  in  the  jaws  of 
vulgarity,  "The  weight  of  my  sins  is  heavy  on  my  soul.'' 
Along  streets  they  go  lifting  heavy  eyes  to  peer  into  the 
lives  of  others  and  to  get  a  morsel  to  roll  upon  their 
heavy  tongues.  Having  fallen  upon  a  side  light  in  the 
life  of  a  Mary  Underwood  they  return  to  it  again  and 
again  as  a  dog  to  its  offal.  Something  touching  the  lives 
of  such  as  walk  in  the  clean  air,  dream  dreams,  and  have 
the  audacity  to  be  beautiful  beyond  the  beauty  of  animal 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  113 

youth,  maddens  them,  and  they  cry  out,  running  from 
kitchen  door  to  kitchen  door  and  tearing  at  the  prize  like 
a  starved  beast  who  has  found  a  carcass.  Let  but  earnest 
women  found  a  movement  and  crowd  it  forward  to  the 
day  when  it  smacks  of  success  and  gives  promise  of  the 
fine  emotion  of  achievement,  and  they  fall  upon  it  with 
a  cry,  having  hysteria  rather  than  reason  as  their  guiding 
impulse.  In  them  is  all  of  femininity — and  none  of  it. 
For  the  most  part  they  live  and  die  unseen,  unknown, 
eating  rank  food,  sleeping  overmuch,  and  sitting  through 
summer  afternoons  rocking  in  chairs  and  looking  at  peo 
ple  passing  in  the  street.  In  the  end  they  die  full  of 
faith,  hoping  for  a  life  to  come. 

Sam  stood  upon  the  road  fearing  the  attacks  these 
women  were  now  making  on  Mary  Underwood.  The 
moon  coming  up,  threw  its  light  on  the  fields  that  lay 
beside  the  road  and  brought  out  their  early  spring  naked 
ness  and  he  thought  them  dreary  and  hideous,  like  the 
faces  of  the  women  that  had  been  marching  through  his 
mind.  He  drew  his  overcoat  about  him  and  shivered 
as  he  went  on,  the  mud  splashing  him  and  the  raw  night 
air  aggravating  the  dreariness  of  his  thoughts.  He  tried 
to  revert  to  the  assurance  of  the  days  before  his  mother's 
illness  and  to  get  again  the  strong  belief  in  his  own  des 
tiny  that  had  kept  him  at  the  money  making  and  saving 
and  had  urged  him  to  the  efforts  to  rise  above  the  level 
of  the  man  who  bred  him.  He  didn't  succeed.  The 
feeling  of  age  that  had  settled  upon  him  in  the  midst  of 
the  people  mourning  over  the  body  of  his  mother  came 
back,  and,  turning,  he  went  along  the  road  toward  the 
town,  saying  to  himself:  "I  will  go  and  talk  to  Mary 
Underwood." 

While  he  waited  on  the  veranda  for  Mary  to  open 
the  door,  he  decided  that  after  all  a  marriage  with  her 
might  lead  to  happiness.  The  half  spiritual,  half  physical 
love  of  woman  that  is  the  glory  and  mystery  of  youth 


114         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

was  gone  from  him.  He  thought  that  if  he  could  only 
drive  from  her  presence  the  fear  of  the  faces  that  had 
been  coming  and  going  in  his  own  mind  he  would,  for  his 
own  part,  be  content  to  live  his  life  as  a  worker  and 
money  maker,  one  without  dreams. 

Mary  Underwood  came  to  the  door  wearing  the  same 
heavy  long  coat  she  had  worn  on  that  other  night  and 
taking  her  by  the  hand  Sam  led  her  to  the  edge  of  the 
veranda.  He  looked  with  content  at  the  pine  trees  before 
the  house,  thinking  that  some  benign  influence  must  have 
guided  the  hand  that  planted  them  there  to  stand  clothed 
and  decent  amid  the  barrenness  of  the  land  at  the  end 
of  winter. 

"What  is  it,  boy?"  asked  the  woman,  and  her  voice 
was  filled  with  anxiety.  The  maternal  passion  again 
glowing  in  her  had  for  days  coloured  all  her  thoughts,  and 
with  all  the  ardour  of  an  intense  nature  she  had  thrown 
herself  into  her  love  of  Sam.  Thinking  of  him,  she  felt 
in  fancy  the  pangs  of  birth,  and  in  her  bed  at  night  relived 
with  him  his  boyhood  in  the  town  and  built  again  her 
plans  for  his  future.  In  the  day  time  she  laughed  at 
herself  and  said  tenderly,  "You  are  an  old  fool." 

Brutally  and  frankly  Sam  told  her  of  the  thing  he  had 
heard  on  the  station  platform,  looking  past  her  at  the 
pine  trees  and  gripping  the  veranda  rail.  From  the  dead 
land  there  came  again  the  smell  of  the  new  growth  as  it 
had  come  to  him  on  the  road  before  the  revelation  at  the 
railroad  station. 

"Something  kept  telling  me  not  to  go  away,"  he  said. 
"It  must  have  been  in  the  air — this  thing.  Already  these 
evil  crawling  things  were  at  work.  Oh,  if  only  all  the 
world,  like  you  and  Telfer  and  some  of  the  others  here, 
had  an  appreciation  of  the  sense  of  privacy." 

Mary  Underwood  laughed  quietly. 

"I  was  more  than  half  right  when,  in  the  old  days,  I 
dreamed  of  making  you  a  man  at  work  upon  the  things 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          115 

of  the  mind,"  she  said.  "The  sense  of  privacy  indeed! 
What  a  fellow  you  have  become !  John  Telf er's  method 
was  better  than  my  own.  He  has  given  you  the  knack 
of  saying  things  with  a  flourish/' 

Sam  shook  his  head. 

"Here  is  something  that  cannot  be  faced  down  with  a 
laugh,"  he  said  stoutly.  "Here  is  something  at  you — it 
is  tearing  at  you — it  has  got  to  be  met.  Even  now 
women  are  waking  up  in  bed  and  turning  the  matter  over 
in  their  minds.  To-morrow  they  will  be  at  you  again. 
There  is  but  one  way  and  we  must  take  it.  You  and  I 
will  have  to  marry." 

Mary  looked  at  the  serious  new  lines  of  his  face. 

"What  a  proposal !"  she  cried. 

On  an  impulse  she  began  singing,  her  voice  fine  and 
strong  running  through  the  quiet  night. 

"He  rode  and  he  thought  of  her  red,  red  lips," 

she  sang,  and  laughed  again. 

"You  should  come  like  that,"  she  said,  and  then,  "you 
poor  muddled  boy.  Don't  you  know  that  I  am  your 
new  mother?"  she  added,  taking  hold  of  his  two  arms 
and  turning  him  about  facing  her.  "Don't  be  absurd.  I 
don't  want  a  husband  or  a  lover.  I  want  a  son  of  my  own 
and  I  have  found  him.  I  adopted  you  here  in  this  house 
that  night  when  you  came  to  me  sick  and  covered  with 
mud.  As  for  these  women — away  with  them — I'll  face 
them  down — I  did  it  once  before  and  I'll  do  it  again.  Go 
to  your  city  and  make  your  fight.  Here  in  Caxton  it  is 
a  woman's  fight." 

"It  is  horrible.  You  don't  understand,"  Sam  pro 
tested. 

A  grey,  tired  look  came  into  Mary  Underwood's 
face. 

"I  understand,"  she  said.    "I  have  been  on  that  battle- 


n6          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

field.  It  is  to  be  won  only  by  silence  and  tireless  wait 
ing.  Your  very  effort  to  help  would  make  the  matter 
worse.'* 

The  woman  and  the  tall  boy,  suddenly  become  a  man, 
stood  in  thought.  She  was  thinking  of  the  end  toward 
which  her  life  was  drifting.  How  differently  she  had 
planned  it.  She  thought  of  the  college  in  Massachusetts 
and  of  the  men  and  women  walking  under  the  elm  trees 
there. 

"But  I  have  got  me  a  son  and  I  am  going  to  keep  him/' 
she  said  aloud,  putting  her  hand  on  Sam's  arm. 

Very  serious  and  troubled,  Sam  went  down  the  gravel 
path  toward  the  road.  He  felt  there  was  something 
cowardly  in  the  part  she  had  given  him  to  play,  but  he 
could  see  no  alternative. 

"After  all,"  he  reflected,  "it  is  sensible — it  is  a  woman's 
battle." 

Half  way  to  the  road  he  stopped  and,  running  back, 
caught  her  in  his  arms  and  gave  her  a  great  hug. 

"Good-bye,  little  Mother,"  he  cried  and  kissed  her  upon 
the  lips. 

And  she,  watching  him  as  he  went  again  down  the 
gravel  path,  was  overcome  with  tenderness.  She  went  to 
the  back  of  the  porch  and  leaning  against  the  house  put 
her  head  upon  her  arm.  Then  turning  and  smiling 
through  her  tears  she  called  after  him. 

"Did  you  crack  their  heads  hard,  boy?"  she  asked. 

From  Mary's  house  Sam  went  to  his  own.  On  the 
gravel  path  an  idea  had  come  to  him.  He  went  into 
the  house  and,  sitting  down  at  the  kitchen  table  with 
pen  and  ink,  began  writing.  In  the  sleeping  room  back 
of  the  parlour  he  could  hear  Windy  snoring.  He  wrote 
carefully,  erasing  and  writing  again.  Then,  drawing  up 
a  chair  before  the  kitchen  fire,  he  read  over  and  over 
what  he  had  written,  and  putting  on  his  coat  went  through 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  117 

the  dawn  to  the  house  of  Tom  Comstock,  editor  of  the 
Caxton  Argus,  and  roused  him  out  of  bed. 

"I'll  run  it  on  the  front  page,  Sam,  and  it  won't  cost 
you  anything,"  Comstock  promised.  "But  why  run  it? 
Let  the  matter  drop." 

"I  shall  just  have  time  to  pack  and  get  the  morning 
train  for  Chicago,"  Sam  thought. 

Early  the  evening  before,  Telfer,  Wildman,  and 
Freedom  Smith,  at  Valmore's  suggestion,  had  made  a 
visit  to  Hunter's  jewelry  store.  For  an  hour  they  bar 
gained,  selected,  rejected,  and  swore  at  the  jeweller. 
When  the  choice  was  made  and  the  gift  lay  shining 
against  white  cotton  in  a  box  on  the  counter  Telfer  made 
a  speech. 

"I  will  talk  straight  to  that  boy,"  he  declared,  laughing. 
"I  am  not  going  to  spend  my  time  training  his  mind  for 
money  making  and  then  have  him  fail  me.  I  shall  tell 
him  that  if  he  doesn't  make  money  in  that  Chicago  I 
shall  come  and  take  the  watch  from  him." 

Putting  the  gift  into  his  pocket  Telfer  went  out  of  the 
store  and  along  the  street  to  Eleanor's  shop.  He  strutted 
through  the  display  room  and  into  the  workshop  where 
Eleanor  sat  with  a  hat  on  her  knee. 

"What  am  I  going  to  do,  Eleanor?"  he  demanded, 
standing  with  legs  spread  apart  and  frowning  down  upon 
her,  "what  am  I  going  to  do  without  Sam?" 

A  freckle-faced  boy  opened  the  shop  door  and  threw 
a  newspaper  on  the  floor.  The  boy  had  a  ringing  voice 
and  quick  brown  eyes.  Telfer  went  again  through  the 
display  room,  touching  with  his  cane  the  posts  upon 
which  hung  the  finished  hats,  and  whistling.  Standing 
before  the  shop,  with  the  cane  hooked  upon  his  arm,  he 
rolled  a  cigarette  and  watched  the  boy  running  from  door 
to  door  along  the  street. 

"I  shall  have  to  be  adopting  a  new  son,"  he  said  mus 
ingly. 


n8          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

After  Sam  left,  Tom  Comstock  stood  in  his  white 
nightgown  and  re-read  the  statement  just  given  him. 
He  read  it  over  and  over,  and  then,  laying  it  on  the 
kitchen  table,  filled  and  lighted  a  corncob  pipe.  A  draft 
of  wind  blew  into  the  room  under  the  kitchen  door 
chilling  his  thin  shanks  so  that  he  drew  his  bare  feet, 
one  after  the  other,  up  behind  the  protective  walls  of  his 
nightgown. 

"On  the  night  of  my  mother's  death,"  ran  the  state 
ment,  "I  sat  in  the  kitchen  of  our  house  eating  my  sup 
per  when  my  father  came  in  and  began  shouting  and 
talking  loudly,  disturbing  my  mother  who  was  asleep. 
I  put  my  hand  at  his  throat  and  squeezed  until  I  thought 
he  was  dead,  and  carried  him  around  the  house  and  threw 
him  into  the  road.  Then  I  ran  to  the  house  of  Mary 
Underwood,  who  was  once  my  schoolteacher,  and  told 
her  what  I  had  done.  She  took  me  home,  awoke  John 
Telfer,  and  then  went  to  look  for  the  body  of  my  father, 
who  was  not  dead  after  all.  John  McPherson  knows 
this  is  true,  if  he  can  be  made  to  tell  the  truth." 

Tom  Comstock  shouted  to  his  wife,  a  small  nervous 
woman  with  red  cheeks,  who  set  up  type  in  the  shop, 
did  her  own  housework,  and  gathered  most  of  the  news 
and  advertising  for  The  Argus. 

"Ain't  that  a  slasher  ?"  he  asked,  handing  her  the  state 
ment  Sam  had  written. 

"Well,  it  ought  to  stop  the  mean  things  they  are  saying 
about  Mary  Underwood,"  she  snapped.  Then,  taking 
the  glasses  from  her  nose,  and  looking  at  Tom,  who,  while 
he  did  not  find  time  to  give  her  much  help  with  The 
Argiis,  was  the  best  checker  player  in  Caxton  and  had 
once  been  to  a  state  tournament  of  experts  in  that  sport, 
she  added,  "Poor  Jane  McPherson,  to  have  had  a  son 
like  Sam  and  no  better  father  for  him  than  that  liar 
Windy.  Choked  him,  eh?  Well,  if  the  men  of  this  town 
had  any  spunk  they  would  finish  the  job." 


BOOK  II 


CHAPTER    I 

FOR  two  years  Sam  lived  the  life  of  a  travelling  buyer, 
visiting  towns  in  Indiana,  Illinois,  and  Iowa,  and  making 
deals  with  men  who,  like  Freedom  Smith,  bought  the 
farmers'  products.  On  Sundays  he  sat  in  chairs  before 
country  hotels  and  walked  in  the  streets  of  strange  towns, 
or,  getting  back  to  the  city  at  the  week  end,  went  through 
the  downtown  streets  and  among  the  crowds  in  the  parks 
with  young  men  he  had  met  on  the  road.  From  time  to 
time  he  went  to  Caxton  and  sat  for  an  hour  with  the  men 
in  Wildman's,  stealing  away  later  for  an  evening  with 
Mary  Underwood. 

In  the  store  he  heard  news  of  Windy,  who  was  laying 
close  siege  to  the  farmer's  widow  he  later  married,  and 
who  seldom  appeared  in  Caxton.  In  the  store  he  saw 
the  boy  with  freckles  on  his  nose — the  same  John  Telfer 
had  watched  running  along  Main  Street  on  the  night 
when  he  went  to  show  Eleanor  the  gold  watch  bought 
for  Sam  and  who  sat  now  on  the  cracker  barrel  in 
the  store  and  later  went  with  Telfer  to  dodge  the 
swinging  cane  and  listen  to  the  eloquence  poured  out  on 
the  night  air.  Telfer  had  not  got  the  chance  to  stand 
with  a  crowd  about  him  at  the  railroad  station  and  make 
a  parting  speech  to  Sam,  and  in  secret  he  resented  the  loss 
of  that  opportunity.  After  turning  the  matter  over  in 
his  mind  and  thinking  of  many  fine  flourishes  and  ringing 
periods  to  give  colour  to  the  speech  he  had  been  compelled 
to  send  the  gift  by  mail.  And  Sam,  while  the  gift  had 

119 


120         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

touched  him  deeply  and  had  brought  back  to  his  mind 
the  essential  solid  goodness  of  the  town  amid  the  corn 
fields,  so  that  he  lost  much  of  the  bitterness  aroused  by 
the  attack  upon  Mary  Underwood,  had  been  able  to  make 
but  a  tame  and  halting  reply  to  the  four.  In  his  room  in 
Chicago  he  had  spent  an  evening  writing  and  rewriting, 
putting  in  and  taking  out  flourishes,  and  had  ended  by 
sending  a  brief  line  of  thanks. 

Valmore,  whose  affection  for  the  boy  had  been  a  slow 
growth  and  who,  now  that  he  was  gone,  missed  him  more 
than  the  others,  once  spoke  to  Freedom  Smith  of  the 
change  that  had  come  over  young  McPherson.  Freedom 
sat  in  the  wide  old  phaeton  in  the  road  before  Valmore's 
shop  as  the  blacksmith  walked  around  the  grey  mare, 
lifting  her  feet  and  looking  at  the  shoes. 

"What  has  happened  to  Sam — he  has  changed  so 
much?"  he  asked,  dropping  a  foot  of  the  mare  and  com 
ing  to  lean  upon  the  front  wheel.  "Already  the  city  has 
changed  him,"  he  added  regretfully. 

Freedom  took  a  match  from  his  pocket  and  lighted  the 
short  black  pipe. 

"He  bites  off  his  words,"  continued  Valmore;  "he 
sits  for  an  hour  in  the  store  and  then  goes  away,  and 
doesn't  come  back  to  say  good-bye  when  he  leaves  town. 
What  has  got  into  him?" 

Freedom  gathered  up  the  reins  and  spat  over  the  dash 
board  into  the  dust  of  the  road.  A  dog  idling  in  the 
street  jumped  as  though  a  stone  had  been  hurled  at 
him. 

"If  you  had  something  he  wanted  to  buy  you  would 
find  he  talked  all  right,"  he  exploded.  "He  skins  me 
out  of  my  eyeteeth  every  time  he  comes  to  town  and  then 
gives  me  a  cigar  wrapped  in  tinfoil  to  make  me  like  it." 

For  some  months  after  his  hurried  departure  from  Cax- 
ton  the  changing,  hurrying  life  of  the  city  profoundly 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  121 

interested  the  tall  strong  boy  from  the  Iowa  village,  who 
had  the  cold,  quick  business  stroke  of  the  money-maker 
combined  with  an  unusually  active  interest  in  the  prob 
lems  of  life  and  of  living.  Instinctively  he  looked  upon 
business  as  a  great  game  in  which  many  men  sat,  and 
in  which  the  capable  quiet  ones  waited  patiently  until 
a  certain  moment  and  then  pounced  upon  what  they 
would  possess.  With  the  quickness  and  accuracy  of  a 
beast  at  the  kill  they  pounced  and  Sam  felt  that  he 
had  that  stroke,  and  in  his  deals  with  country  buyers 
used  it  ruthlessly.  He  knew  the  vague  uncertain  look 
that  came  into  the  eyes  of  unsuccessful  business  men 
at  critical  moments  and  watched  for  it  and  took  advan 
tage  of  it  as  a  successful  prize  fighter  watches  for  a 
similar  vague  uncertain  look  in  the  eyes  of  an  opponent. 

He  had  found  his  work,  and  had  the  assurance  and  the 
confidence  that  comes  with  that  discovery.  The  stroke 
that  he  saw  in  the  hand  of  the  successful  business  men 
about  him  is  the  stroke  also  of  the  master  painter,  scien 
tist,  actor,  singer,  prize  fighter.  It  was  the  hand  of 
Whistler,  Balzac,  Agassiz,  and  Terry  McGovern.  The 
sense  of  it  had  been  in  him  when  as  a  boy  he  watched 
the  totals  grow  in  the  yellow  bankbook,  and  now  and 
then  he  recognised  it  in  Telfer  talking  on  a  country  road. 
In  the  city  where  men  of  wealth  and  power  in  affairs 
rubbed  elbows  with  him  in  the  street  cars  and  walked 
past  him  in  hotel  lobbies  he  watched  and  waited  saying 
to  himself,  "I  also  will  be  such  a  one." 

Sam  had  not  lost  the  vision  that  had  come  to  him 
when  as  a  boy  he  walked  on  the  road  and  listened  to 
the  talk  of  Telfer,  but  he  now  thought  of  himself  as 
one  who  had  not  only  a  hunger  for  achievement  but 
also  a  knowledge  of  where  to  look  for  it.  At  times  he 
had  stirring  dreams  of  vast  work  to  be  done  by  his 
hand  that  made  the  blood  race  in  him,  but  for  the  most 
part  he  went  his  way  quietly,  making  friends,  looking 


122         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

about  him,  keeping  his  mind  busy  with  his  own  thoughts, 
making  deals. 

During  his  first  year  in  the  city  he  lived  in  the  house 
of  an  ex-Caxton  family  named  Pergrin  that  had  been  in 
Chicago  for  several  years,  but  that  still  continued  to 
send  its  members,  one  at  a  time,  to  spend  summer  vaca 
tions  in  the  Iowa  village.  To  these  people  he  carried  let 
ters  handed  him  during  the  month  after  his  mother's 
death,  and  letters  regarding  him  had  come  to  them  from 
Caxton.  In  the  house,  where  eight  people  sat  down  to 
dinner,  only  three  besides  himself  were  Caxton-bred,  but 
thoughts  and  talk  of  the  town  pervaded  the  house  and 
crept  into  every  conversation. 

"I  was  thinking  of  old  John  Moore  to-day — does  he 
still  drive  that  team  of  black  ponies?"  the  housekeeping 
sister,  a  mild-looking  woman  of  thirty,  would  ask  of 
Sam  at  the  dinner  table,  breaking  in  on  a  conversation 
of  baseball,  or  a  tale  by  one  of  the  boarders  of  a  new 
office  building  to  be  erected  in  the  loop. 

"No,  he  don't,"  Jake  Pergrin,  a  fat  bachelor  of  forty 
who  was  foreman  in  a  machine  shop  and  the  man  of 
the  house,  would  answer.  So  long  had  Jake  been  the 
final  authority  in  the  house  on  affairs  touching  Caxton 
that  he  looked  upon  Sam  as  an  intruder.  "John  told 
me  last  summer  when  I  was  home  that  he  intended  to 
sell  the  blacks  and  buy  mules,"  he  would  add,  looking 
at  the  youth  challengingly. 

The  Pergrin  family  was  in  fact  upon  foreign  soil. 
Living  amid  the  roar  and  bustle  of  Chicago's  vast  west 
side,  it  still  turned  with  hungry  heart  toward  the  place 
of  corn  and  of  steers,  and  wished  that  work  for  Jake, 
its  mainstay,  could  be  found  in  that  paradise. 

Jake  Pergrin,  a  bald-headed  man  with  a  paunch,  stub 
by  iron-grey  moustache,  and  a  dark  line  of  machine  oil 
encircling  his  finger  nails  so  that  they  stood  forth  sepa 
rately  like  formal  flower  beds  at  the  edge  of  a  lawn, 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          123 

worked  industriously  from  Monday  morning  until  Sat 
urday  night,  going  to  bed  at  nine  o'clock,  and  until  that 
hour  wandering,  whistling,  from  room  to  room  through 
the  house,  in  a  pair  of  worn  carpet  slippers,  or  sit 
ting  in  his  room  practising  on  a  violin.  On  Saturday 
evening,  the  habits  formed  in  his  Caxton  days  being 
strong  in  him,  he  came  home  with  his  pay  in  his  pocket, 
settled  with  the  two  sisters  for  the  week's  living,  sat 
down  to  dinner  neatly  shaved  and  combed,  and  then  dis 
appeared  upon  the  troubled  waters  of  the  town.  Late 
on  Sunday  evening  he  re-appeared,  with  empty  pockets, 
unsteady  step,  blood-shot  eyes,  and  a  noisy  attempt  at 
self-possessed  unconcern,  to  hurry  upstairs  and  crawl 
into  bed  in  preparation  for  another  week  of  toil  and  re 
spectability.  The  man  had  a  certain  Rabelaisian  sense 
of  humour  and  kept  score  of  the  new  ladies  met  on  his 
weekly  flights  by  pencil  marks  upon  his  bedroom  wall. 
He  once  took  Sam  upstairs  to  show  his  record.  A  row 
of  them  ran  half  around  the  room. 

Besides  the  bachelor  there  was  a  sister,  a  tall  gaunt 
woman  of  thirty-five  who  taught  school,  and  the  house 
keeper,  thirty,  mild,  and  blessed  with  a  remarkably  sweet 
speaking  voice.  Then  there  was  a  medical  student  in 
the  front  room,  Sam  in  an  alcove  off  the  hall,  a  grey- 
haired  woman  stenographer,  whom  Jake  called  Marie 
Antoinette,  and  a  buyer  from  a  wholesale  drygoods 
house,  with  a  vivacious,  fun-loving  little  Southern 
wife. 

The  women  in  the  Pergrin  house  seemed  to  Sam  tre 
mendously  concerned  about  their  health  and  each  evening 
talked  of  the  matter,  he  thought,  more  than  his  mother 
had  talked  during  her  illness.  While  Sam  lived  with 
them  they  were  all  under  the  influence  of  a  strange  sort 
of  faith  healer  and  took  what  they  called  "Health  Sug 
gestion"  treatments.  Twice  each  week  the  faith  healer 
came  to  the  house,  laid  his  hands  upon^ their  backs  and 


124         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

took  their  money.  The  treatment  afforded  Jake  a  never- 
ending  source  of  amusement  and  in  the  evening  he  went 
through  the  house  putting  his  hands  upon  the  backs  of 
the  women  and  demanding  money  from  them,  but  the 
dry-goods  buyer's  wife,  who  for  years  had  coughed  at 
night,  slept  peacefully  after  some  weeks  of  the  treatment 
and  the  cough  did  not  return  while  Sam  remained  in  the 
house. 

In  the  house  Sam  had  a  standing.  Glowing  tales  of 
his  shrewdness  in  business,  his  untiring  industry,  and 
the  size  of  his  bank  account,  had  preceded  him  from 
Caxton,  and  these  tales  the  Pergrins,  in  their  loyalty  to 
the  town  and  to  all  the  products  of  the  town,  did  not 
allow  to  shrink  in  the  re-telling.  The  housekeeping  sis 
ter,  a  kindly  woman,  became  fond  of  Sam,  and  in  his  ab 
sence  would  boast  of  him  to  chance  callers  or  to  the 
boarders  gathered  in  the  living  room  in  the  evening. 
She  it  was  who  laid  the  foundation  of  the  medical  stu 
dent's  belief  that  Sam  was  a  kind  of  genius  in  money 
matters,  a  belief  that  enabled  him  later  to  make  a  suc 
cessful  assault  upon  a  legacy  which  came  to  that  young 
man. 

Frank  Eckardt,  the  medical  student,  Sam  took  as  a 
friend.  On  Sunday  afternoons  they  went  to  walk  in 
the  streets,  or,  taking  two  girl  friends  of  Frank's,  who 
were  also  students  at  the  medical  school,  on  their 
arms,  they  went  to  the  park  and  sat  upon  benches 
under  the  trees. 

For  one  of  these  young  women  Sam  conceived  a  re 
gard  that  approached  tenderness.  Sunday  after  Sunday 
he  spent  with  her,  and  once,  walking  through  the  park 
on  an  evening  in  the  late  fall,  the  dry  brown  leaves  rust 
ling  under  their  feet  and  the  sun  going  down  in  red 
splendour  before  their  eyes,  he  took  her  hand  and  walked 
in  silence,  feeling  tremendously  alive  and  vital  as  he 
had  felt  on  that  other  night  walking  under  the  trees  of 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  125 

Caxton  with  the  dark-skinned  daughter  of  banker 
Walker. 

That  nothing  came  of  the  affair  and  that  after  a  time 
he  did  not  see  the  girl  again  was  due,  he  thought,  to  his 
own  growing  interest  in  money  making  and  to  the  fact 
that  there  was  in  her,  as  in  Frank  Eckardt,  a  blind  devo 
tion  to  something  that  he  could  not  himself  understand. 

Once  he  had  a  talk  with  Eckardt  of  the  matter.  "She 
is  fine  and  purposeful  like  a  woman  I  knew  in  my  home 
town/'  he  said,  thinking  of  Eleanor  Telfer,  "but  she 
will  not  talk  to  me  of  her  work  as  sometimes  she  talks 
to  you.  I  want  her  to  talk.  There  is  something  about 
her  that  I  do  not  understand  and  that  I  want  to  under 
stand.  I  think  that  she  likes  me  and  once  or  twice  I 
have  thought  she  would  not  greatly  mind  my  making 
love  to  her,  but  I  do  not  understand  her  just  the  same/' 

One  day  in  the  office  of  the  company  for  which  he 
worked  Sam  became  acquainted  with  a  young  advertising 
man  named  Jack  Prince,  a  brisk,  very  much  alive  young 
fellow  who  made  money  rapidly,  spent  it  lavishly,  and 
had  friends  and  acquaintances  in  every  office,  every  hotel 
lobby,  every  bar  room  and  restaurant  in  the  down-town 
section  of  the  city.  The  chance  acquaintance  rapidly 
grew  into  friendship.  The  clever  witty  Prince  made  a 
kind  of  hero  of  Sam,  admiring  his  reserve  and  good 
sense  and  boasting  of  him  far  and  wide  through  the  town. 
With  Prince,  Sam  occasionally  went  on  mild  carouses, 
and,  once,  in  the  midst  of  thousands  of  people  sitting 
about  tables  and  drinking  beer  at  the  Coliseum  on  Wa- 
bash  Avenue,  he  and  Prince  got  into  a  fight  with  two 
waiters,  Prince  declaring  he  had  been  cheated  and  Sam, 
although  he  thought  his  friend  in  the  wrong,  striking 
out  with  his  fist  and  dragging  Prince  through  the  door 
and  into  a  passing  street  car  in  time  to  avoid  a  rush  of 
other  waiters  hurrying  to  the  aid  of  the  one  who  lay 
dazed  and  sputtering  on  the  sawdust  floor. 


126          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

After  these  evenings  of  carousal,  carried  on  with  Jack 
Prince  and  with  young  men  met  on  trains  and  about 
country  hotels,  Sam  spent  hour  after  hour  walking  about 
town  absorbed  in  his  own  thoughts  and  getting  his  own 
impressions  of  what  he  saw.  In  the  affairs  with  the 
young  men  he  played,  for  the  most  part,  a  passive  role, 
going  with  them  from  place  to  place  and  drinking  until 
they  became  loud  and  boisterous,  or  morose  and  quarrel 
some,  and  then  slipping  away  to  his  own  room,  amused 
or  irritated  as  the  circumstances,  or  the  temperament  of 
his  companions,  had  made  or  marred  the  joviality  of  the 
evening.  On  his  nights  alone,  he  put  his  hands  into  his 
pockets  and  walked  for  endless  miles  through  the  lighted 
streets,  getting  in  a  dim  way  a  realisation  of  the  huge 
ness  of  life.  All  of  the  faces  going  past  him,  the  women 
in  their  furs,  the  young  men  with  cigars  in  their  mouths 
going  to  the  theatres,  the  bald  old  men  with  watery 
eyes,  the  boys  with  bundles  of  newspapers  under  their 
arms,  and  the  slim  prostitutes  lurking  in  the  hallways, 
should  have  interested  him  deeply.  In  his  youth,  and 
with  the  pride  of  sleeping  power  in  him,  he  saw  them 
only  as  so  many  individuals  that  might  some  day  test 
their  ability  against  his  own.  And  if  he  peered  at  them 
closely  and  marked  down  face  after  face  in  the  crowds 
it  was  as  a  sitter  in  the  great  game  of  business  that  he 
looked,  exercising  his  mind  by  imagining  this  or  that 
one  arrayed  against  him  in  deals,  and  planning  the 
method  by  which  he  would  win  in  the  imaginary  struggle. 

There  was  at  that  time  in  Chicago  a  place,  to  be 
reached  by  a  bridge  above  the  Illinois  Central  Railroad 
track,  that  Sam  sometimes  visited  on  stormy  nights  to 
watch  the  lake  lashed  by  the  wind.  Great  masses  of 
water  moving  swiftly  and  silently  broke  with  a  roar 
against  wooden  piles,  backed  by  hills  of  stone  and  earth, 
and  the  spray  from  the  broken  waves  fell  upon  Sam's 
face  and  on  winter  nights  froze  on  his  coat.  He  had 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  127 

learned  to  smoke,  and  leaning  upon  the  railing  of  the 
bridge  would  stand  for  hours  with  a  pipe  in  his  mouth 
looking  at  the  moving  water,  filled  with  awe  and  admira 
tion  of  the  silent  power  of  it. 

One  night  in  September,  when  he  was  walking  alone 
in  the  streets,  an  incident  happened  that  showed  him  also 
a  silent  power  within  himself,  a  power  that  startled  and 
for  the  moment  frightened  him.  Walking  into  a  little 
street  back  of  Dearborn,  he  was  suddenly  aware  of  the 
faces  of  women  looking  out  at  him  through  small  square 
windows  cut  in  the  fronts  of  the  houses.  Here  and 
there,  before  and  behind  him,  were  the  faces;  voices 
called,  smiles  invited,  hands  beckoned.  Up  and  down  the 
street  went  men  looking  at  the  sidewalk,  their  coats 
turned  up  about  their  necks,  their  hats  pulled  down  over 
their  eyes.  They  looked  at  the  faces  of  the  women 
pressed  against  the  little  squares  of  glass  and  then,  turn 
ing,  suddenly,  sprang  in  at  the  doors  of  the  houses  as 
if  pursued.  Among  the  walkers  on  the  sidewalk  were 
old  men,  men  in  shabby  coats  whose  feet  scuffled  as  they 
hurried  along,  and  young  boys  with  the  pink  of  virtue 
in  their  cheeks.  In  the  air  was  lust,  heavy  and  hideous. 
It  got  into  Sam's  brain  and  he  stood  hesitating  and  un 
certain,  startled,  nerveless,  afraid.  He  remembered  a 
story  he  had  once  heard  from  John  Telfer,  a  story  of  the 
disease  and  death  that  lurks  in  the  little  side  streets  of 
cities,  and  ran  into  Van  Buren  Street  and  from  that 
into  lighted  State.  He  climbed  up  the  stairway  of  the 
elevated  railroad  and  jumping  on  the  first  train  went 
away  south  to  walk  for  hours  on  a  gravel  roadway  at 
the  edge  of  the  lake  in  Jackson  Park.  The  wind  from 
the  lake  and  the  laughter  and  talk  of  people  passing  under 
the  lights  cooled  the  fever  in  him,  as  once  it  had  been 
cooled  by  the  eloquence  of  John  Telfer,  walking  on  the 
road  near  Caxton,  and  with  his  voice  marshalling  the 
armies  of  the  standing  corn. 


128          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

Into  Sam's  mind  came  a  picture  of  the  cold  silent 
water  moving  in  great  masses  under  the  night  sky  and 
he  thought  that  in  the  world  of  men  there  was  a  force 
as  resistless,  as  little  understood,  as  little  talked  of,  mov 
ing  always  forward,  silent,  powerful — the  force  of  sex. 
He  wondered  how  the  force  would  be  broken  in  his 
own  case,  against  what  breakwater  it  would  spend  it 
self.  At  midnight,  he  went  home  across  the  city  and 
crept  into  his  alcove  in  the  Pergrin  house,  puzzled  and 
for  the  time  utterly  tired.  In  his  bed,  he  turned  his  face 
to  the  wall  and  resolutely  closing  his  eyes  tried  to  sleep. 
"There  are  things  not  to  be  understood,"  he  told  himself. 
"To  live  decently  is  a  matter  of  good  sense.  I  will  keep 
thinking  of  what  I  want  to  do  and  not  go  into  such  a 
place  again." 

One  day,  when  he  had  been  in  Chicago  two  years,  there 
happened  an  incident  of  another  sort,  an  incident  so 
grotesque,  so  Pan-like,  so  full  of  youth,  that  for  days 
after  it  happened  he  thought  of  it  with  delight,  and 
walked  in  the  streets  or  sat  in  a  passenger  train  laugh 
ing  joyfully  at  the  remembrance  of  some  new  detail 
of  the  affair. 

Sam,  who  was  the  son  of  Windy  McPherson  and 
who  had  more  than  once  ruthlessly  condemned  all  men 
who  put  liquor  into  their  mouths,  got  drunk,  and  for 
eighteen  hours  went  shouting  poetry,  singing  songs,  and 
yelling  at  the  stars  like  a  wood  god  on  the  bend. 

Late  on  an  afternoon  in  the  early  spring  he  sat  with 
Jack  Prince  in  Dejonge's  restaurant  in  Monroe  Street. 
Prince,  his  watch  lying  before  him  on  the  table  and  the 
thin  stem  of  a  wine  glass  between  his  fingers,  talked  to 
Sam  of  the  man  for  whom  they  had  been  waiting  a  half 
hour. 

"He  will  be  late,  of  course,"  he  exclaimed,  refilling 
Sam's  glass.  "The  man  was  never  on  time  in  his  life. 
To  keep  an  appointment  promptly  would  take  something 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  129 

from  him.  It  would  be  like  the  bloom  of  youth  gone 
from  the  cheeks  of  a  maiden." 

Sam  had  already  seen  the  man  for  whom  they  waited. 
He  was  thirty-five,  small  and  narrow-shouldered,  with 
a  little  wrinkled  face,  a  huge  nose,  and  a  pair  of  eye 
glasses  that  hooked  over  his  ears.  Sam  had  seen  him  in 
a  Michigan  Avenue  club  with  Prince  solemnly  pitching 
silver  dollars  at  a  chalk  mark  on  the  floor  with  a  group  of 
serious  solid-looking  old  men. 

"They  are  the  crowd  that  have  just  put  through  the 
big  deal  in  Kansas  oil  stock  and  the  little  one  is  Morris, 
who  handled  the  publicity  for  them/'  Prince  had  ex 
plained. 

Later,  when  they  were  walking  down  Michigan  Ave 
nue,  Prince  talked  at  length  of  Morris,  whom  he  ad 
mired  immensely.  "He  is  the  best  advertising  and  pub 
licity  man  in  America/'  he  declared.  "He  isn't  a  four- 
flusher,  as  I  am,  and  does  not  make  as  much  money,  but 
he  can  take  another  man's  ideas  and  express  them  so 
simply  and  forcibly  that  they  tell  the  man's  story  better 
than  he  knew  it  himself.  And  that's  all  there  is  to  ad 
vertising." 

He  began  laughing. 

"It  is  funny  to  think  of  it.  Tom  Morris  will  do  a  job 
of  work  and  the  man  for  whom  he  does  it  will  swear 
that  he  did  it  himself,  that  every  pat  phrase  on  the 
printed  page  Tom  has  turned  out,  is  one  of  his  own. 
He  will  howl  like  a  beast  at  paying  Tom's  bill,  and  then 
the  next  time  he  will  try  to  do  the  job  himself  and  make 
a  hopeless  muddle  of  it  so  that  he  has  to  send  for  Tom 
only  to  see  the  trick  done  over  again  like  shelling  corn 
off  the  cob.  The  best  men  in  Chicago  send  for  him." 

Into  the  restaurant  came  Tom  Morris  bearing  under 
his  arm  a  huge  pasteboard  portfolio.  He  seemed  hur 
ried  and  nervous.  "I  am  on  my  way  to  the  office  of  the 
International  Biscuit  Turning  Machine  Company/'  he 


i3o         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

explained  to  Prince.  "I  can't  stop  at  all.  I  have  here 
the  layout  of  a  circular  designed  to  push  on  to  the  market 
some  more  of  that  common  stock  of  theirs  that  hasn't 
paid  a  dividend  for  ten  years." 

Thrusting  out  his  hand,  Prince  dragged  Morris  into 
a  chair.  "Never  mind  the  Biscuit  Machine  people  and 
their  stock,"  he  commanded;  "they  will  always  have 
common  stock  to  sell.  It  is  inexhaustible.  I  want  you 
to  meet  McPherson  here  who  will  some  day  have  some 
thing  big  for  you  to  help  him  with." 

Morris  reached  across  the  table  and  took  Sam's  hand ; 
his  own  was  small  and  soft  like  that  of  a  woman.  "I  am 
worked  to  death,"  he  complained;  "I  have  my  eye  on  a 
chicken  farm  in  Indiana.  I  am  going  down  there  to 
live." 

For  an  hour  the  three  men  sat  in  the  restaurant  while 
Prince  talked  of  a  place  in  Wisconsin  where  the  fish 
should  be  biting.  "A  man  has  told  me  of  the  place 
twenty  times,"  he  declared;  "I  am  sure  I  could  find  it 
on  a  railroad  folder.  I  have  never  been  fishing  nor  have 
you,  and  Sam  here  comes  from  a  place  to  which  they 
carry  water  in  wagons  over  the  plains." 

The  little  man  who  had  been  drinking  copiously  of  the 
wine  looked  from  Prince  to  Sam.  From  time  to  time  he 
took  off  his  glasses  and  wiped  them  with  a  handkerchief. 
"I  don't  understand  your  being  in  such  society,"  he  an 
nounced;  "you  have  the  solid,  substantial  look  of  a 
bucket-shop  man.  Prince  here  will  get  nowhere.  He  is 
honest,  sells  wind  and  his  charming  society  and  spends 
the  money  that  he  gets,  instead  of  marrying  and  putting 
it  in  his  wife's  name." 

Prince  arose.  "It  is  useless  to  waste  time  in  persi 
flage,"  he  began  and  then  turning  to  Sam,  "There  is  a 
place  in  Wisconsin,"  he  said  uncertainly. 

Morris  picked  up  the  portfolio  and  with  a  grotesque  ef 
fort  at  steadiness  started  for  the  door  followed  by  Prince 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  131 

and  Sam  walking  with  wavering  steps.  In  the  street 
Prince  took  the  portfolio  out  of  the  little  man's  hand. 
"Let  your  mother  carry  it,  Tommy,"  he  said,  shaking 
his  finger  under  Morris's  nose.  He  began  singing  a 
lullaby.  "When  the  bough  bends  the  cradle  will  fall." 

The  three  men  walked  out  of  Monroe  and  into  State 
Street,  Sam's  head  feeling  strangely  light  The  build 
ings  along  the  street  reeled  against  the  sky  A  sudden 
fierce  longing  for  wild  adventure  seized  him.  On  a 
corner  Morris  stopped,  took  the  handkerchief  from  his 
pocket  and  again  wiped  his  glasses.  "I  want  to  be  sure 
that  I  see  clearly,"  he  said;  "it  seems  to  me  that  in  the 
bottom  of  that  last  glass  of  wine  I  saw  three  of  us  in  a 
cab  with  a  basket  of  life  oil  on  the  seat  between  us  going 
to  the  station  to  catch  the  train  for  that  place  Jack's 
friend  told  fish  lies  about." 

The  next  eighteen  hours  opened  up  a  new  world  to 
Sam.  With  the  fumes  of  liquor  rising  in  his  brain,  he 
rode  for  two  hours  on  a  train,  tramped  in  the  darkness 
along  dusty  roads  and,  building  a  bonfire  in  a  woods, 
danced  in  the  light  of  it  upon  the  grass,  holding  the  hands 
of  Prince  and  the  little  man  with  the  wrinkled  face. 
Solemnly  he  stood  upon  a  stump  at  the  edge  of  a  wheat- 
field  and  recited  Poe's  "Helen,"  taking  on  the  voice,  the 
gestures  and  even  the  habit  of  spreading  his  legs  apart, 
of  John  Telfer.  And  then  overdoing  the  last,  he  sat 
down  suddenly  on  the  stump,  and  Morris,  coming  for 
ward  with  a  bottle  in  his  hand  said,  "Fill  the  lamp,  man 
• — the  light  of  reason  has  gone  out." 

From  the  bonfire  in  the  woods  and  Sam's  recital 
from  the  stump,  the  three  friends  emerged  again  upon 
the  road,  and  a  belated  farmer  driving  home  half  asleep 
on  the  seat  of  his  wagon  caught  their  attention.  With  the 
skill  of  an  Indian  boy  the  diminutive  Morris  sprang  upon 
the  wagon  and  thrust  a  ten  dollar  bill  into  the  farmer's 
hand.  ' '  Lead  us,  O  man  of  the  soil ! "  he  shouted, '  *  Lead 


132          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

us  to  a  gilded  palace  of  sin!  Take  us  to  a  saloon !  The 
life  oil  gets  low  in  the  can!" 

Beyond  the  long  jolting  ride  in  the  wagon  Sam  never 
became  quite  clear.  In  his  mind  ran  vague  notions  of 
a  wild  carousal  in  a  country  tavern,  of  himself  acting  as 
bartender,  and  a  huge  red-faced  woman  rushing  ,here 
and  there  under  the  direction  of  a  tiny  man,  dragging 
reluctant  rustics  to  the  bar  and  commanding  them  to 
keep  on  drinking  the  beer  that  Sam  drew  until  the  last 
of  the  ten  dollars  given  to  the  man  of  the  wagon  should 
have  gone  into  her  cash  drawer.  Also,  he  thought  that 
Jack  Prince  had  put  a  chair  upon  the  bar  and  that  he  sat 
on  it  explaining  to  the  hurrying  drawer  of  beer  that  al 
though  the  Egyptian  kings  had  built  great  pyramids  to 
celebrate  themselves  they  never  built  anything  more  gi 
gantic  than  the  jag  Tom  Morris  was  building  among  the 
farm  hands  in  the  room. 

Later  Sam  thought  that  he  and  Jack  Prince  tried  to 
sleep  under  a  pile  of  grain  sacks  in  a  shed  and  that  Mor 
ris  came  to  them  weeping  because  every  one  in  the  world 
was  asleep  and  most  of  them  lying  under  tables. 

And  then,  his  head  clearing,  Sam  found  himself  with 
the  two  others  walking  again  upon  the  dusty  road  in  the 
dawn  and  singing  songs. 

On  the  train,  with  the  help  of  a  negro  porter,  the  three 
men  tried  to  efface  the  dust  and  the  stains  of  the  wild 
night.  The  pasteboard  portfolio  containing  the  circular 
for  the  Biscuit  Machine  Company  was  still  under  Jack 
Prince's  arm  and  the  little  man,  wiping  and  re-wiping 
his  glasses,  peered  at  Sam. 

"Did  you  come  with  us  or  are  you  a  child  we  have 
adopted  here  in  these  parts?"  he  asked. 


CHAPTER  II 

IT  was  a  wonderful  place,  that  South  Water  Street 
in  Chicago  where  Sam  came  to  make  his  business  start 
in  the  city,  and  it  was  proof  of  the  dry  unresponsiveness 
in  him  that  he  did  not  sense  more  fully  its  meaning  and 
its  message.  All  day  the  food  stuff  of  a  vast  city  flowed 
through  the  narrow  streets.  Blue-shirted  broad-shoul 
dered  teamsters  from  the  tops  of  high  piled  wagons 
bawled  at  scurrying  pedestrians.  On  the  sidewalks 
in  boxes,  bags,  and  barrels,  lay  oranges  from  Florida 
and  California,  figs  from  Arabia,  bananas  from  Jamaica, 
nuts  from  the  hills  of  Spain  and  the  plains  of  Africa, 
cabbages  from  Ohio,  beans  from  Michigan,  corn  and 
potatoes  from  Iowa.  In  December,  fur-coated  men  hur 
ried  through  the  forests  of  northern  Michigan  gathering 
Christmas  trees  that  found  their  way  to  warm  firesides 
through  the  street.  And  summer  and  winter  a  million 
hens  laid  the  eggs  that  were  gathered  there,  and  the 
cattle  on  a  thousand  hills  sent  their  yellow  butter  fat 
packed  in  tubs  and  piled  upon  trucks  to  add  to  the  con 
fusion. 

Into  this  street  Sam  walked,  thinking  little  of  the 
wonder  of  these  things  and  thinking  haltingly,  getting 
his  sense  of  the  bigness  of  it  in  dollars  and  cents.  Stand 
ing  in  the  doorway  of  the  commission  house  for  which 
he  was  to  work,  strong,  well  clad,  able  and  efficient,  he 
looked  through  the  streets,  seeing  and  hearing  the  hurry 
and  the  roar  and  the  shouting  of  voices,  and  then  with  a 
smile  upon  his  lips  went  inside.  In  his  brain  was  an  un 
expressed  thought.  As  the  old  Norse  marauders  looked 

133 


i34          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

at  the  cities  sitting  in  their  splendour  on  the  Mediter 
ranean  so  looked  he.  "What  loot!"  a  voice  within  him 
said,  and  his  brain  began  devising  methods  by  which  he 
should  get  his  share  of  it. 

Years  later,  when  Sam  was  a  man  of  big  affairs,  he 
drove  one  day  in  a  carriage  through  the  streets  and  turn 
ing  to  his  companion,  a  grey-haired,  dignified  Boston  man 
who  sat  beside  him  said,  "I  worked  here  once  and  used 
to  sit  on  a  barrel  of  apples  at  the  edge  of  the  sidewalk 
thinking  how  clever  I  was  to  make  more  money  in  one 
month  than  the  man  who  raised  the  apples  made  in  a 
year." 

The  Boston  man,  stirred  by  the  sight  of  so  much  food 
stuff  and  moved  to  epigram  by  his  mood,  looked  up  and 
down  the  street. 

"The  food  stuff  of  an  empire  rattling  o'er  the  stones," 
he  said. 

"I  should  have  made  more  money  here,"  answered 
Sam  dryly. 

The  commission  firm  for  which  Sam  worked  was  a 
partnership,  not  a  corporation,  and  was  owned  by  two 
brothers.  Of  the  two  Sam  thought  that  the  elder,  a 
tall,  bald,  narrow-shouldered  man,  with  a  long  narrow 
face  and  a  suave  manner,  was  the  real  master,  and  rep 
resented  most  of  the  ability  in  the  partnership.  He  was 
oily,  silent,  tireless.  All  day  he  went  in  and  out  of  the 
office  and  warehouses  and  up  and  down  the  crowded 
street,  sucking  nervously  at  an  unlighted  cigar.  He 
was  a  great  worker  in  a  suburban  church,  but  a  shrewd 
and,  Sam  suspected,  an  unscrupulous  business  man.  Oc 
casionally  the  minister  or  some  of  the  women  of  the 
suburban  church  came  into  the  office  to  talk  with  him, 
and  Sam  was  amused  at  the  thought  that  Narrow  Face, 
when  he  talked  of  the  affairs  of  the  church,  bore  a  strik 
ing  resemblance  to  the  brown-bearded  minister  of  the 
church  in  Caxton. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  135 

The  other  brother  was  a  far  different  sort,  and,  in 
business,  Sam  thought,  a  much  inferior  man.  He  was  a 
heavy,  broad-shouldered,  square-faced  man  of  about 
thirty,  who  sat  in  the  office  dictating  letters  and  who 
stayed  out  two  or  three  hours  to  lunch.  He  sent  out 
letters  signed  by  him  on  the  firm's  stationery  with  the  title 
of  General  Manager,  and  Narrow  Face  let  him  do  it. 
Broad  Shoulders  had  been  educated  in  New  England  and 
even  after  several  years  away  from  his  college  seemed 
more  interested  in  it  than  in  the  welfare  of  the  business. 
For  a  month  or  more  in  the  spring  he  took  most  of  the 
time  of  one  of  the  two  stenographers  employed  by  the 
firm  writing  letters  to  graduates  of  Chicago  High  Schools 
to  induce  them  to  go  East  to  finish  their  education ;  and 
when  a  graduate  of  the  college  came  to  Chicago  seeking 
employment,  he  closed  his  desk  and  spent  entire  days 
going  from  place  to  place,  introducing,  urging,  recom 
mending.  Sam  noticed,  however,  that  when  the  firm  em 
ployed  a  new  man  in  their  own  office  or  on  the  road 
it  was  Narrow-Face  who  chose  the  man. 

Broad-Shoulders  had  been  a  famous  football  player 
in  his  day  and  wore  an  iron  brace  on  his  leg.  The 
offices,  like  most  of  the  offices  on  the  street,  were  dark 
and  narrow,  and  smelled  of  decaying  vegetables  and 
rancid  butter.  Noisy  Greek  and  Italian  hucksters  wran 
gled  on  the  sidewalk  in  front,  and  among  these  went 
Narrow-Face  hurrying  about  making  deals. 

In  South  Water  Street  Sam  did  well,  multiplying  Ahis 
thirty-six  hundred  dollars  by  ten  during  the  three  years 
that  he  stayed  there,  or  went  out  from  there  to  towns 
and  cities  directing  a  part  of  the  great  flowing  river  of 
foodstuff  through  his  firm's  front  door. 

With  almost  his  first  day  on  the  street  he  began  seeing 
on  all  sides  of  him  opportunity  for  gain,  and  set  him 
self  industriously  at  work  to  get  his  hand  upon  money 
with  which  to  take  advantage  of  the  chances  that  he 


136         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

thought  lay  so  invitingly  about.  Within  a  year  he  had 
made  much  progress.  From  a  woman  on  Wabash  Ave 
nue  he  got  six  thousand  dollars,  and  he  planned  and  exe 
cuted  a  coup  that  gave  him  the  use  of  twenty  thousand 
dollars  that  had  come  as  a  legacy  to  his  friend,  the 
medical  student,  who  lived  at  the  Pergrin  house. 

Sam  had  eggs  and  apples  lying  in  warehouse  against 
a  rise ;  game,  smuggled  across  the  state  line  from  Mich 
igan  and  Wisconsin,  lay  frozen  in  cold  storage  tagged 
with  his  name  and  ready  to  be  sold  at  a  long  profit  to 
hotels  and  fashionable  restaurants ;  and  there  were  even 
secret  bushels  of  corn  and  wheat  lying  in  other  ware 
houses  along  the  Chicago  River  ready  to  be  thrown  on 
the  market  at  a  word  from  him,  or,  the  margins  by  which 
he  kept  his  hold  on  the  stuff  not  being  forthcoming,  at 
a  word  from  a  LaSalle  Street  broker. 

Getting  the  twenty  thousand  dollars  out  of  the  hands 
of  the  medical  student  was  a  turning  point  in  Sam's 
life.  Sunday  after  Sunday  he  walked  with  Eckardt 
in  the  streets  or  loitered  with  him  in  the  parks  thinking 
of  the  money  lying  idle  in  the  bank  and  of  the  deals 
he  might  be  turning  with  it  in  the  street  or  on  the  road. 
Daily  he  saw  more  clearly  the  power  of  cash.  Other 
commission  merchants  along  South  Water  Street  came 
running  into  the  office  of  his  firm  with  tense  anxious 
faces  asking  Narrow-Face  to  help  them  over  rough  spots 
in  the  day's  trading.  Broad-Shoulders,  who  had  no 
business  ability  but  who  had  married  a  rich  woman, 
went  on  month  after  month  taking  half  the  profits 
brought  in  by  the  ability  of  his  tall  shrewd  brother,  and 
Narrow-Pace,  who  had  taken  a  liking  for  Sam  and  who 
occasionally  stopped  for  a  word  with  him,  spoke  of  the 
matter  often  and  eloquently. 

"Spend  your  time  with  no  one  who  hasn't  money  to 
help  you,"  he  said;  "on  the  road  look  for  the  men  with 
money  and  then  try  to  get  it.  That's  all  there  is  to  busi- 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  137 

ness — money-getting."  And  then  looking  across  to  the 
desk  of  his  brother  he  would  add,  "I  would  kick  half 
the  men  in  business  out  of  it  if  I  could,  but  I  myself 
must  dance  to  the  tune  that  money  plays." 

One  day  Sam  went  to  the  office  of  an  attorney  named 
Webster,  whose  reputation  for  the  shrewd  drawing  of 
contracts  had  come  to  him  from  Narrow-Face. 

"I  want  a  contract  drawn  that  will  give  me  absolute 
control  of  twenty  thousand  dollars  with  no  risk  on  my 
part  if  I  lose  the  money  and  no  promise  to  pay  more 
than  seven  per  cent  if  I  do  not  lose,"  he  said. 

The  attorney,  a  slender,  middle-aged  man  with  a 
swarthy  skin  and  black  hair,  put  his  hands  on  the  desk 
before  him  and  looked  at  the  tall  young  man. 

"What  collateral?"  he  asked. 

Sam  shook  his  head.  "Can  you  draw  such  a  contract 
that  will  be  legal  and  what  will  it  cost  me?"  he  asked. 

The  lawyer  laughed  good  naturedly.  "I  can  draw  it 
of  course.  Why  not?" 

Sam,  taking  a  roll  of  bills  from  his  pocket,  counted 
the  amount  upon  the  table. 

"Who  are  you  anyway?"  asked  Webster.  "If  you 
can  get  twenty  thousand  and  without  collateral  you're 
worth  knowing.  I  might  be  getting  up  a  gang  to,  rob 
a  mail  train." 

Sam  did  not  answer.  He  put  the  contract  in  his  pocket 
and  went  home  to  his  alcove  at  the  Pergrins.  He  wanted 
to  get  by  himself  and  think.  He  did  not  believe  that 
he  would  by  any  chance  lose  Frank  Eckardt's  money,  but 
he  knew  that  Eckardt  himself  would  draw  back  from 
the  kind  of  deals  that  he  expected  to  make  with  the 
money,  that  they  would  frighten  and  alarm  him,  and  he 
wondered  if  he  was  being  honest. 

In  his  own  room  after  dinner  Sam  studied  carefully 
the  agreement  drawn  by  Webster.  It  seemed  to  him  to 
cover  what  he  wanted  covered,  and  having  got  it  well 


138          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

fixed  in  his  mind  he  tore  it  up.  "There  is  no  use  his 
knowing  I  have  been  to  a  lawyer,"  he  thought  guiltily. 

Getting  into  bed,  he  began  building  plans  for  the  fu 
ture.  With  more  than  thirty  thousand  dollars  at  his 
command  he  thought  that  he  should  be  able  to  make 
headway  rapidly.  "In  my  hands  it  will  double  itself 
every  year,"  he  told  himself  and  getting  out  of  bed  he 
drew  a  chair  to  the  window  and  sat  down,  feeling 
strangely  alive  and  awake  like  a  young  man  in  love.  He 
saw  himself  going  on  and  on,  directing,  managing,  ruling 
men.  It  seemed  to  him  that  there  was  nothing  he  could 
not  do.  "I  will  run  factories  and  banks  and  maybe  mines 
and  railroads,"  he  thought  and  his  mind  leaped  for 
ward  so  that  he  saw  himself,  grey,  stern,  and  capable, 
sitting  at  a  broad  desk  high  in  a  great  stone  building,  a 
materialisation  of  John  Telfer's  word  picture — "You  will 
be  a  big  man  of  dollars — it  is  plain." 

And  then  into  Sam's  mind  came  another  picture.  He 
remembered  a  Saturday  afternoon  when  a  young  man 
had  come  running  into  the  office  on  South  Water  Street, 
a  young  man  who  owed  Narrow-Face  a  sum  of  money 
and  could  not  pay  it.  He  remembered  the  unpleasant 
tightening  of  the  mouth  and  the  sudden  shrewd  hard 
look  in  his  employer's  long  narrow  face.  He  had  not 
heard  much  of  the  talk,  but  he  was  aware  of  a  strained 
pleading  quality  in  the  voice  of  the  young  man  who  had 
said  over  and  over  slowly  and  painfully,  "But,  man,  my 
honour  is  at  stake,"  and  of  a  coldness  in  the  answering 
voice  replying  persistently,  "With  me  it  is  not  a  matter 
of  honour  but  of  dollars,  and  I  am  going  to  get  them." 

From  the  alcove  window  Sam  looked  out  upon  a  vacant 
lot  covered  with  patches  of  melting  snow.  Beyond  the 
lot  facing  him  stood  a  flat  building,  and  the  snow,  melt 
ing  on  the  roof,  made  a  little  stream  that  ran  down 
some  hidden  pipe  and  rattled  out  upon  the  ground.  The 
noise  of  the  falling  water  and  the  sound  of  distant  foot- 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          139 

steps  going  homeward  through  the  sleeping  city  brought 
back  thoughts  of  other  nights  when  as  a  boy  in  Caxton 
he  had  sat  thus,  thinking  disconnected  thoughts. 

Without  knowing  it  Sam  was  fighting  one  of  the  real 
battles  of  his  life,  a  battle  in  which  the  odds  were  very 
much  against  the  quality  in  him  that  got  him  out  of  bed 
to  look  at  the  snow-clad  vacant  lot. 

There  was  in  the  youth  much  of  the  brute  trader, 
blindly  intent  upon  gain;  much  of  the  quality  that  has 
given  America  so  many  of  its  so-called  great  men.  It 
was  the  quality  that  had  sent  him  in  secret  to  Lawyer 
Webster  to  protect  himself  without  protecting  the  simple 
credulous  young  medical  student,  and  that  had  made 
him  say  as  he  came  home  with  the  contract  in  his  pocket, 
"I  will  do  what  I  can/'  when  in  truth  he  meant,  "I  will 
get  what  I  can." 

There  may  be  business  men  in  America  who  do  not  get 
what  they  can,  who  simply  love  power.  One  sees  men 
here  and  there  in  banks,  at  the  heads  of  great  industrial 
trusts,  in  factories  and  in  great  mercantile  houses  of 
whom  one  would  like  to  think  thus.  They  are  the  men 
who  one  dreams  have  had  an  awakening,  who  have  found 
themselves;  they  are  the  men  hopeful  thinkers  try  to 
recall  again  and  again  to  the  mind. 

To  these  men  America  is  looking.  It  is  asking  them 
to  keep  the  faith,  to  stand  themselves  up  against  the 
force  of  the  brute  trader,  the  dollar  man,  the  man  who 
with  his  one  cunning  wolf  quality  of  acquisitiveness  has 
too  long  ruled  the  business  of  the  nation. 

I  have  said  that  the  sense  of  equity  in  Sam  fought  an 
unequal  battle.  He  was  in  business,  and  young  in  busi 
ness,  in  a  day  when  all  America  was  seized  with  a  blind 
grappling  for  gain.  The  nation  was  drunk  with  it,  trusts 
were  being  formed,  mines  opened;  from  the  ground 
spurted  oil  and  gas ;  railroads  creeping  westward  opened 
yearly  vast  empires  of  new  land.  To  be  poor  was  to 


i4o         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

be  a  fool ;  thought  waited,  art  waited ;  and  men  at  their 
firesides  gathered  their  children  around  them  and  talked 
glowingly  of  men  of  dollars,  holding  them  up  as  prophets 
fit  to  lead  the  youth  of  the  young  nation. 

Sam  had  in  him  the  making  of  the  new,  the  command 
ing  man  of  business.  It  was  that  quality  in  him  that 
made  him  sit  by  the  window  thinking  before  going  to  the 
medical  student  with  the  unfair  contract,  and  the  same 
quality  had  sent  him  forth  night  after  night  to  walk 
alone  in  the  streets  when  other  young  men  went  to 
theatres  or  to  walk  with  girls  in  the  park.  He  had,  in 
truth,  a  taste  for  the  lonely  hours  when  thought  grows. 
He  was  a  step  beyond  the  youth  who  hurries  to  the 
theatre  or  buries  himself  in  stories  of  love  or  adventure. 
He  had  in  him  something  that  wanted  a  chance. 

In  the  flat  building  across  the  vacant  lot  a  light  ap 
peared  at  a  window  and  through  the  lighted  window  he 
saw  a  man  clad  in  pajamas  who  propped  a  sheet  of  music 
against  a  dressing-table  and  who  had  a  shining  silver 
horn  in  his  hand.  Sam  watched,  filled  with  mild  curi 
osity.  The  man,  not  reckoning  on  an  onlooker  at  so  late 
an  hour,  began  an  elaborate  and  amusing  schedule  of 
personation.  He  opened  the  window,  put  the  horn  to 
his  lips  and  then  turning  bowed  before  the  lighted  room 
as  before  an  audience.  He  put  his  hand  to  his  lips  and 
blew  kisses  about,  then  put  the  horn  to  his  lips  and 
looked  again  at  the  sheet  of  music. 

The  note  that  came  out  of  the  window  on  the  still  air 
was  a  failure,  it  flattened  into  a  squawk.  Sam  laughed 
and  pulled  down  the  window.  The  incident  had  brought 
back  to  his  mind  another  man  who  bowed  to  a  crowd 
and  blew  upon  a  horn.  Getting  into  bed  he  pulled  the 
covers  about  him  and  went  to  sleep.  "I  will  get  Frank's 
money  if  I  can,"  he  told  himself,  settling  the  matter  that 
had  been  in  his  mind.  "Most  men  are  fools  and  if  I 
do  not  get  his  money  some  other  man  will." 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          141 

On  the  next  afternoon  Eckardt  had  lunch  down  town 
with  Sam.  Together  they  went  to  a  bank  where  Sam 
showed  the  profits  of  deals  he  had  made  and  the  growth 
of  his  bank  account,  going  afterward  into  South  Water 
Street  where  Sam  talked  glowingly  of  the  money  to  be 
made  by  a  shrewd  man  who  knew  the  ways  of  the  street 
and  had  a  head  upon  his  shoulders. 

"That's  just  it,"  said  Frank  Eckardt,  falling  quickly 
into  the  trap  Sam  had  set,  and  hungering  for  profits; 
"I  have  money  but  no  head  on  my  shoulders  for  using 
it.  I  wish  you  would  take  it  and  see  what  you  can  do." 

With  a  thumping  heart  Sam  went  home  across  the 
city  to  the  Pergrin  house,  Eckardt  beside  him  in  the 
elevated  train.  In  Sam's  room  the  agreement  was  writ 
ten  out  by  Sam  and  signed  by  Eckardt.  At  dinner 
time  they  had  the  drygoods  buyer  in  to  sign  as  witness. 

And  the  agreement  turned  out  to  Eckardt's  advantage. 
In  no  year  did  Sam  return  him  less  than  ten  per  cent, 
and  in  the  end  gave  back  the  principal  more  than  doubled 
so  that  Eckardt  was  able  to  retire  from  the  practice  of 
medicine  and  live  upon  the  interest  of  his  capital  in  a 
village  near  Tiffin,  Ohio. 

With  the  thirty  thousand  dollars  in  his  hands  Sam 
began  to  reach  out  and  extend  the  scope  of  his  ven 
tures.  He  bought  and  sold  constantly,  not  only  eggs, 
butter,  apples,  and  grain,  but  also  houses  and  building 
lots.  Through  his  head  marched  long  rows  of  figures. 
Deals  worked  themselves  out  in  detail  in  his  brain  as 
he  went  about  town  drinking  with  young  men,  or  sat 
at  dinner  in  the  Pergrin  house.  He  even  began  work 
ing  over  in  his  head  various  schemes  for  getting  into  the 
firm  by  which  he  was  employed,  and  thought  that  he 
might  work  upon  Broad-Shoulders,  getting  hold  of  his 
interest  and  forcing  himself  into  control.  And  then,  the 
fear  of  Narrow-Face  holding  him  back  and  his  growing 
success  in  deals  keeping  his  mind  occupied,  he  was  sud- 


i42          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

denly  confronted  by  an  opportunity  that  changed  en 
tirely  the  plans  he  was  making  for  himself. 

Through  Jack  Prince's  suggestion  Colonel  Tom  Rainey 
of  the  great  Rainey  Arms  Company  sent  for  him  and 
offered  him  a  position  as  buyer  of  all  the  materials  used 
in  their  factories. 

It  was  the  kind  of  connection  Sam  had  unconsciously 
been  seeking — a  company,  strong,  old,  conservative, 
known  throughout  the  world.  There  was,  in  the  talk 
with  Colonel  Tom,  a  hint  of  future  opportunities  to  get 
stock  in  the  company  and  perhaps  to  become  eventually 
an  official — these  things  were  of  course  remote — to  be 
dreamed  of  and  worked  toward — the  company  made  it 
a  part  of  its  policy. 

Sam  said  nothing,  but  already  he  had  decided  to  ac 
cept  the  place,  and  was  thinking  of  a  profitable  arrange 
ment  touching  percentages  on  the  amount  saved  in  buy 
ing  that  had  worked  out  so  well  for  him  during  his  years 
with  Freedom  Smith. 

Sam's  work  for  the  firearms  company  took  him  off  the 
road  and  confined  him  to  an  office  all  day  long.  In  a 
way  he  regretted  this.  The  complaints  he  had  heard 
among  travelling  men  in  country  hotels  with  regard  to 
the  hardship  of  travel  meant  nothing  to  his  mind.  Any 
kind  of  travel  was  a  keen  pleasure  to  him.  Against 
the  hardships  and  discomforts  he  balanced  the  tremen 
dous  advantages  of  seeing  new  places  and  faces  and  get 
ting  a  look  into  many  lives,  and  he  looked  back  with  a 
kind  of  retrospective  joy  on  the  three  years  of  hurrying 
from  place  to  place,  catching  trains,  and  talking  with 
chance  acquaintances  met  by  the  way.  Also,  the  years 
on  the  road  had  given  him  many  opportunities  for  secret 
and  profitable  deals  of  his  own. 

Over  against  these  advantages  the  place  at  Rainey's 
threw  him  into  close  and  continuous  association  with 
men  of  big  affairs.  The  offices  of  the  Arms  Company 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          143 

occupied  an  entire  floor  of  one  of  Chicago's  newest  and 
biggest  skyscrapers  and  millionaire  stockholders  and  men 
high  in  the  service  of  the  state  and  of  the  government 
at  Washington  came  in  and  went  out  at  the  door.  Sam 
looked  at  them  closely.  He  wanted  to  have  a  tilt  with 
them  and  try  if  his  Caxton  and  South  Water  Street 
shrewdness  would  keep  the  head  upon  his  shoulders  in 
LaSalle  Street.  The  opportunity  seemed  to  him  a  big 
one  and  he  went  about  his  work  quietly  and  ably,  intent 
upon  making  the  most  of  it. 

The  Rainey  Arms  Company,  at  the  time  of  Sam's  com 
ing  with  it,  was  still  largely  owned  by  the  Rainey  family, 
father  and  daughter.  Colonel  Rainey,  a  grey-whiskered 
military  looking  man  with  a  paunch,  was  the  president 
and  largest  individual  stockholder.  He  was  a  pompous, 
swaggering  old  fellow  with  a  habit  of  making  the  most 
trivial  statement  with  the  air  of  a  judge  pronouncing 
the  death  sentence,  and  sat  dutifully  at  his  desk  day  after 
day  looking  very  important  and  thoughtful,  smoking  long 
black  cigars  and  signing  personally  piles  of  letters  brought 
him  by  the  heads  of  various  departments.  He  looked 
upon  himself  as  a  silent  but  very  important  spoke  in  the 
government  at  Washington  and  every  day  issued  many 
orders  which  the  men  at  the  heads  of  departments  re 
ceived  with  respect  and  disregarded  in  secret.  Twice  he 
had  been  prominently  mentioned  in  connection  with  cab 
inet  positions  in  the  national  government,  and  in  talks 
with  his  cronies  at  clubs  and  restaurants  he  gave  the  im 
pression  of  having  actually  refused  an  offer  of  appoint 
ment  on  both  occasions. 

Having  got  himself  established  as  a  factor  in  the  man 
agement  of  the  business,  Sam  found  many  things  that 
surprised  him.  In  every  company  of  which  he  knew 
there  was  some  one  man  to  whom  all  looked  for  guid 
ance,  who  at  critical  moments  became  dominant,  saying 
"Do  this,  or  that,"  and  making  no  explanations.  In  the 


144         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

Rainey  Company  he  found  no  such  man,  but,  instead,  a 
dozen  strong  departments,  each  with  its  own  head  and 
each  more  or  less  independent  of  the  others. 

Sam  lay  in  his  bed  at  night  and  went  about  in  the 
evening  thinking  of  this  and  of  its  meaning.  Among  the 
department  heads  there  was  a  great  deal  of  loyalty  and 
devotion  to  Colonel  Tom,  and  he  thought  that  among 
them  were  a  few  men  who  were  devoted  to  other  in 
terests  than  their  own. 

At  the  same  time  he  told  himself  there  was  something 
wrong.  He  himself  had  no  such  feeling  of  loyalty  and 
although  he  was  willing  to  give  lip  service  to  the  re 
sounding  talk  of  the  Colonel  about  the  fine  old  traditions 
of  the  company,  he  could  not  bring  himself  to  a  belief  in 
the  idea  of  conducting  a  vast  business  on  a  system 
founded  upon  lip  service  to  traditions,  or  upon  loyalty 
to  an  individual. 

"There  must  be  loose  ends  lying  about  everywhere," 
he  thought  and  followed  the  thought  with  another.  "A 
man  will  come  along,  pick  up  these  loose  ends,  and  run 
the  whole  shop.  Why  not  I  ?" 

The  Rainey  Arms  Company  had  made  its  millions  for 
the  Rainey  and  Whittaker  families  during  the  Civil  War. 
Whittaker  had  been  an  inventor,  making  one  of  the  first 
practical  breech-loading  guns,  and  the  original  Rainey 
had  been  a  drygoods  merchant  in  an  Illinois  town  who 
backed  the  inventor. 

It  proved  itself  a  rare  combination.  Whittaker  de 
veloped  into  a  wonderful  shop  manager  for  his  day,  and, 
from  the  first,  stayed  at  home  building  rifles  and  making 
improvements,  enlarging  the  plant,  getting  out  the  goods. 
The  drygoods  merchant  scurried  about  the  country,  go 
ing  to  Washington  and  to  the  capitals  of  the  individual 
states,  pulling  wires,  appealing  to  patriotism  and  state 
pride,  taking  big  orders  at  fat  prices. 

In  Chicago  there  is  a  tradition  that  more  than  once  he 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          145 

went  south  of  the  Dixie  line  and  that  following  these 
trips  thousands  of  Rainey-Whittaker  rifles  found  their 
way  into  the  hands  of  Confederate  soldiers,  but  this 
story  which  increased  Sam's  respect  for  the  energetic 
little  drygoods  merchant,  Colonel  Tom,  his  son,  indig 
nantly  denied.  In  reality  Colonel  Tom  would  have  liked 
to  think  of  the  first  Rainey  as  a  huge,  Jove-like  god  of 
arms.  Like  Windy  McPherson  of  Caxton,  given  a 
chance,  he  would  have  invented  a  new  ancestor. 

After  the  Civil  War,  and  Colonel  Tom's  growing  to 
manhood,  the  Rainey  and  Whittaker  fortunes  were 
merged  into  one  through  the  marriage  of  Jane  Whittaker, 
the  last  of  her  line,  to  the  only  surviving  Rainey,  and 
upon  her  death  her  fortune,  grown  to  more  than  a  mil 
lion,  stood  in  the  name  of  Sue  Rainey,  twenty-six,  the 
only  issue  of  the  marriage. 

From  the  first  day,  Sam  began  to  forge  ahead  in  the 
Rainey  Company.  In  the  buying  end  he  found  a  rich 
field  for  spectacular  money  saving  and  money  making 
and  made  the  most  of  it.  The  position  as  buyer  had  for 
ten  years  been  occupied  by  a  distant  cousin  to  Colonel 
Tom,  now  dead.  Whether  the  cousin  was  a  fool  or  a 
knave  Sam  could  never  quite  decide  and  did  not  greatly 
care,  but  after  he  had  got  the  situation  in  hand  he  felt 
that  the  man  must  have  cost  the  company  a  tremendous 
sum,  which  he  intended  to  save. 

Sam's  arrangement  with  the  company  gave  him,  be 
sides  a  fair  salary,  half  he  saved  in  the  fixed  prices  of 
standard  materials.  These  prices  had  stood  fixed  for 
years  and  Sam  went  into  them,  cutting  right  and  left, 
and  making  for  himself  during  his  first  year  twenty- 
three  thousand  dollars.  At  the  end  of  the  year,  when 
the  directors  asked  to  have  an  adjustment  made  and  the 
percentage  contract  annulled,  he  got  a  generous  slice  of 
company  stock,  the  respect  of  Colonel  Tom  Rainey  and 
the  directors,  the  fear  of  some  of  the  department  heads, 


i46         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

the  loyal  devotion  of  others,  and  the  title  of  Treasurer 
of  the  company. 

The  Rainey  Arms  Company  was  in  truth  living  largely 
upon  the  reputation  built  up  for  it  by  the  first  pushing- 
energetic  Rainey,  and  the  inventive  genius  of  his  partner, 
Whittaker.  Under  Colonel  Tom  it  had  found  new  con 
ditions  and  new  competition  which  he  had  ignored,  or 
met  in  a  half-hearted  way,  standing  on  its  reputation,  its 
financial  strength,  and  on  the  glory  of  its  past  achieve 
ments.  Dry  rot  ate  at  its  heart.  The  damage  done  was 
not  great,  but  was  growing  greater.  The  heads  of  the 
departments,  in  whose  hands  so  much  of  the  running  of 
the  business  lay,  were  many  of  them  incompetent  men 
with  nothing  to  commend  them  but  long  years  of  service. 
And  in  the  treasurer's  office  sat  a  quiet  young  man,  barely 
turned  twenty,  who  had  no  friends,  wanted  his  own  way, 
and  who  shook  his  head  over  the  office  traditions  and 
was  proud  of  his  unbelief. 

Seeing  the  absolute  necessity  of  working  through  Col 
onel  Tom,  and  having  a  head  filled  with  ideas  of  things 
he  wanted  done,  Sam  began  working  to  get  suggestions 
into  the  older  man's  mind.  Within  a  month  after  his 
elevation  the  two  men  were  lunching  together  daily  and 
Sam  was  spending  many  extra  hours  behind  closed  doors 
in  Colonel  Tom's  office. 

Although  American  business  and  manufacturing  had 
not  yet  achieved  the  modern  idea  of  efficiency  in  shop 
and  office  management,  Sam  had  many  of  these  ideas  in 
his  mind  and  expounded  them  tirelessly  to  Colonel  Tom. 
He  hated  waste;  he  cared  nothing  for  company  tradi 
tion;  he  had  no  idea,  as  did  the  heads  of  other  depart 
ments,  of  getting  into  a  comfortable  berth  and  spending 
the  rest  of  his  days  there,  and  he  was  bent  on  managing 
the  great  Rainey  Company,  if  not  directly,  then  through 
Colonel  Tom,  who,  he  felt,  was  putty  in  his  hands. 

From  his  new  position  as  treasurer  Sam  did  not  drop 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  147 

his  work  as  buyer,  but,  after  a  talk  with  Colonel  Tom, 
merged  the  two  departments,  put  in  capable  assistants  of 
his  own,  and  went  on  with  his  work  of  effacing  the  tracks 
of  the  cousin.  For  years  the  company  had  been  over 
paying  for  inferior  material.  Sam  put  his  own  material 
inspectors  into  the  west  side  factories  and  brought  sev 
eral  big  Pennsylvania  steel  companies  scurrying  to  Chi 
cago  to  make  restitution.  The  restitution  was  stiff,  but 
when  Colonel  Tom  was  appealed  to,  Sam  went  to  lunch 
with  him,  bought  a  bottle  of  wine,  and  stiffened  his 
back. 

One  afternoon  in  a  room  in  the  Palmer  House  a  scene 
was  played  out  that  for  days  stayed  in  Sam's  mind  as  a 
kind  of  realisation  of  the  part  he  wanted  to  play  in  the 
business  world.  The  president  of  a  lumber  company 
took  Sam  into  the  room,  and,  laying  five  one  thousand 
dollar  bills  upon  a  table,  walked  to  the  window  and  stood 
looking  out. 

For  a  moment  Sam  stood  looking  at  the  money  on 
the  table  and  at  the  back  of  the  man  by  the  window, 
burning  with  indignation.  He  felt  that  he  should  like 
to  take  hold  of  the  man's  throat  and  press  as  he  had 
once  pressed  on  the  throat  of  Windy  McPherson.  And 
then  a  cold  gleam  coming  into  his  eyes  he  cleared  his 
throat  and  said,  "You  are  short  here;  you  will  have  to 
build  this  pile  higher  if  you  expect  to  interest  me." 

The  man  by  the  window  shrugged  his  shoulders — he 
was  a  slender,  young-looking  man  in  a  fancy  waistcoat — 
and  then  turning  and  taking  a  roll  of  bills  from  his  pocket 
he  walked  to  the  table,  facing  Sam. 

"I  shall  expect  you  to  be  reasonable,"  he  said,  as  he 
laid  the  bills  on  the  table. 

When  the  pile  had  reached  twenty  thousand,  Sam 
reached  out  his  hand  and  taking  it  up  put  it  in  his  pocket. 
"You  will  get  a  receipt  for  this  when  I  get  back  to  the 
office,"  he  said ;  "it  is  about  what  you  owe  our  company 


148          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

for  overcharges  and  crooked  material.  As  for  our  busi 
ness,  I  made  a  contract  with  another  company  this 
morning." 

Having  got  the  buying  end  of  The  Rainey  Arms  Com 
pany  straightened  out  to  his  liking,  Sam  began  spending 
much  time  in  the  shops  and,  through  Colonel  Tom,  forced 
big  changes  everywhere.  He  discharged  useless  fore 
men,  knocked  out  partitions  between  rooms,  pushed 
everywhere  for  more  and  better  work.  Like  the  modern 
efficiency  man,  he  went  about  with  a  watch  in  his  hand, 
cutting  out  lost  motion,  rearranging,  getting  his  own 
way. 

It  was  a  time  of  great  agitation.  The  offices  and  shops 
buzzed  like  bees  disturbed  and  black  looks  followed 
him  about.  But  Colonel  Tom  rose  to  the  situation  and 
went  about  at  Sam's  heels,  swaggering,  giving  orders, 
throwing  back  his  shoulders  like  a  man  remade.  All 
day  long  he  was  at  it,  discharging,  directing,  roaring 
against  waste.  When  a  strike  broke  out  in  one  of  the 
shops  because  of  innovations  Sam  had  forced  upon  the 
workmen  there,  he  got  upon  a  bench  and  delivered  a 
speech — written  by  Sam — on  a  man's  place  in  the  organi 
sation  and  conducting  of  a  great  modern  industry  and 
his  duty  to  perfect  himself  as  a  workman. 

Silently,  the  men  picked  up  their  tools  and  started 
again  for  their  benches  and  when  he  saw  them  thus  af 
fected  by  his  words  Colonel  Tom  brought  what  threat 
ened  to  be  a  squally  affair  to  a  hurrahing  climax  by  the 
announcement  of  a  five  per  cent  increase  in  the  wage 
scale — that  was  Colonel  Tom's  own  touch  and  the  rous 
ing  reception  of  it  brought  a  glow  of  pride  to  his  cheeks. 

Although  the  affairs  of  the  company  were  still  being 
handled  by  Colonel  Tom,  and  though  he  daily  more  and 
more  asserted  himself,  the  officers  and  shops,  and  later 
the  big  jobbers  and  buyers  as  well  as  the  rich  LaSalle 
Street  directors,  knew  that  a  new  force  had  come  into 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  149 

the  company.  Men  began  dropping  quietly  into  Sam's 
office,  asking  questions,  suggesting,  seeking  favours.  He 
felt  that  he  was  getting  hold.  Of  the  department  heads, 
about  half  fought  him  and  were  secretly  marked  for 
slaughter ;  the  others  came  to  him,  expressed  approval  of 
what  was  going  on  and  asked  him  to  look  over  their 
departments  and  to  make  suggestions  for  improvements 
through  them.  This  Sam  did  eagerly,  getting  by  it  their 
loyalty  and  support  which  later  stood  him  in  good  stead. 

In  choosing  the  new  men  that  came  into  the  company 
Sam  also  took  a  hand.  The  method  used  was  character 
istic  of  his  relations  with  Colonel  Tom.  If  a  man  apply 
ing  for  a  place  suited  him,  he  got  admission  to  the 
colonel's  office  and  listened  for  half  an  hour  to  a  talk 
anent  the  fine  old  traditions  of  the  company.  If  a  man 
did  not  suit  Sam,  he  did  not  get  to  the  colonel.  "You 
can't  have  your  time  taken  up  by  them,"  Sam  explained. 

In  the  Rainey  Company,  the  various  heads  of  depart 
ments  were  stockholders  in  the  company,  and  selected 
from  among  themselves  two  men  to  sit  upon  the  board, 
and  in  his  second  year  Sam  was  chosen  as  one  of  these 
employee  directors.  During  the  same  year,  five  heads 
of  departments  resigning  in  a  moment  of  indignation 
over  one  of  Sam's  innovations — to  be  replaced  later  by 
two — their  stock  by  a  prearranged  agreement  came  back 
into  the  company's  hands.  This  stock  and  another  block, 
secured  for  him  by  the  colonel,  got  into  Sam's  hands 
through  the  use  of  Eckardt's  money,  that  of  the  Wa- 
bash  Avenue  woman,  and  his  own  snug  pile. 

Sam  was  a  growing  force  in  the  company.  He  sat  on 
the  board  of  directors,  the  recognised  practical  head  of 
the  business  among  its  stockholders  and  employees;  he 
had  stopped  the  company's  march  toward  a  second  place 
in  its  industry  and  had  faced  it  about.  All  about  him,  in 
offices  and  shops,  there  was  the  swing  and  go  of  new  life 
and  he  felt  that  he  was  in  a  position  to  move  on  toward 


150         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

real  control  and  had  begun  laying  lines  with  that  end 
in  view.  Standing  in  the  offices  in  LaSalle  Street  or 
amid  the  clang  and  roar  of  the  shops  he  tilted  up  his 
chin  with  the  same  odd  little  gesture  that  had  attracted 
the  men  of  Caxton  to  him  when  he  was  a  barefoot  news 
boy  and  the  son  of  the  town  drunkard.  Through  his 
head  went  big  ambitious  projects.  "I  have  in  my  hand 
a  great  tool,"  he  thought;  "with  it  I  will  pry  my  way 
into  the  place  I  mean  to  occupy  among  the  big  men  of 
this  city  and  this  nation/1 


CHAPTER  III 

SAM  McPiiERSON,  who  stood  in  the  shops  among  the 
thousand  of  employees  of  The  Rainey  Arms  Company, 
who  looked  with  unseeing  eyes  at  the  faces  of  the  men 
intent  upon  the  operation  of  machines  and  saw  in  them 
but  so  many  aids  to  the  ambitious  projects  stirring  in  his 
brain,  who,  while  yet  a  boy,  had  because  of  the  quality 
of  daring  in  him,  combined  with  a  gift  of  acquisitiveness, 
become  a  master,  who  was  untrained,  uneducated,  know 
ing  nothing  of  the  history  of  industry  or  of  social  ef 
fort,  walked  out  of  the  offices  of  his  company  and  along 
through  the  crowded  streets  to  the  new  apartment  he 
had  taken  on  Michigan  Avenue.  It  was  Saturday  even 
ing  at  the  end  of  a  busy  week  and  as  he  walked  he 
thought  of  things  he  had  accomplished  during  the  week 
and  made  plans  for  the  one  to  come.  Through  Madi 
son  Street  he  went  and  into  State,  seeing  the  crowds  of 
men  and  women,  boys  and  girls,  clambering  aboard  the 
cable  cars,  massed  upon  the  pavements,  forming  in 
groups,  the  groups  breaking  and  reforming,  and  the 
whole  making  a  picture  intense,  confusing,  awe-inspiring. 
As  in  the  shops  among  the  men  workers,  so  here,  also, 
walked  the  youth  with  unseeing  eyes.  He  liked  it  all; 
the  mass  of  people;  the  clerks  in  their  cheap  clothing; 
the  old  men  with  young  girls  on  their  arms  going  to 
dine  in  restaurants ;  the  young  man  with  the  wistful  look 
in  his  eyes  waiting  for  his  sweetheart  in  the  shadow  of 
the  towering  office  building.  The  eager  straining  rush 
of  the  whole,  seemed  no  more  to  him  than  a  kind  of 
gigantic  setting  for  action;  action  controlled  by  a  few 

151 


152         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

quiet,  capable  men — of  whom  he  intended  to  be  one — 
intent  upon  growth. 

In  State  Street  he  stopped  at  a  shop  and  buying  a 
bunch  of  roses  came  out  again  upon  the  crowded  street. 
In  the  crowd  before  him  walked  a  woman — tall,  free- 
walking,  with  a  great  mass  of  reddish-brown  hair  on  her 
head.  As  she  passed  through  the  crowd  men  stopped 
and  looked  back  at  her,  their  eyes  ablaze  with  admiration. 
Seeing  her,  Sam  sprang  forward  with  a  cry. 

"Edith!"  he  called,  and  running  forward  thrust  the 
roses  into  her  hand.  "For  Janet,"  he  said,  and  lifting 
his  hat  walked  beside  her  along  State  to  Van  Buren 
Street.  ^ 

Leaving  the  woman  at  a  corner  Sam  came  into  a 
region  of  cheap  theatres  and  dingy  hotels.  Women  spoke 
to  him;  young  men  in  flashy  overcoats  and  with  a  pe 
culiar,  assertive,  animal  swing  to  their  shoulders  loitered 
before  the  theatres  or  in  the  doorways  of  the  hotels; 
from  an  upstairs  restaurant  came  the  voice  of  another 
young  man  singing  a  popular  song  of  the  street.  "There'll 
be  a  hot  time  in  the  old  town  to-night,"  sang  the  voice. 

Over  a  cross  street  Sam  went  into  Michigan  Avenue, 
faced  by  a  long  narrow  park  and  beyond  the  railroad 
tracks  by  the  piles  of  new  earth  where  the  city  was  try 
ing  to  regain  its  lake  front.  In  the  cross  street,  standing 
in  the  shadow  of  the  elevated  railroad,  he  had  passed 
a  whining,  intoxicated  old  woman  who  lurched  forward 
and  put  a  hand  upon  his  coat.  Sam  had  flung  her  a 
quarter  and  passed  on  shrugging  his  shoulders.  Here 
also  he  had  walked  with  unseeing  eyes;  this  too  was 
a  part  of  the  gigantic  machine  with  which  the  quiet,  com 
petent  men  of  growth  worked. 

From  his  new  quarters  in  the  top  floor  of  the  hotel 
facing  the  lake,  Sam  walked  north  along  Michigan  Ave 
nue  to  a  restaurant  where  negro  men  went  noiselessly 
about  among  white-clad  tables,  serving  men  and  women 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  153 

who  talked  and  laughed  under  the  shaded  lamps  and  had 
an  assured  confident  air.  Passing  in  at  the  door  of  the 
restaurant,  a  wind,  blowing  over  the  City  toward  the 
lake,  brought  the  sound  of  a  voice  floating  with  it. 
"There'll  be  a  hot  time  in  the  old  town  to-night,"  again 
insisted  the  voice. 

After  dining  Sam  got  on  a  grip  car  of  the  Wabash 
Avenue  Cable,  sitting  on  the  front  seat  and  letting  the 
panorama  of  the  town  roll  up  to  him.  From  the  region 
of  cheap  theatres  he  passed  through  streets  in  which 
saloons  stood  massed,  one  beside  another,  each  with  its 
wide  garish  doorway  and  its  dimly  lighted  "Ladies'  En 
trance,"  and  into  a  region  of  neat  little  stores  where 
women  with  baskets  upon  their  arms  stood  by  the  coun 
ters  and  Sam  was  reminded  of  Saturday  nights  in  Caxton. 

The  two  women,  Edith  and  Janet  Eberly,  met  through 
Jack  Prince,  to  one  of  whom  Sam  had  sent  the  roses  at 
the  hands  of  the  other,  and  from  whom  he  had  borrowed 
the  six  thousand  dollars  when  he  was  new  in  the  city,  had 
been  in  Chicago  for  five  years  when  Sam  came  to  know 
them.  For  all  of  the  five  years  they  had  lived  in  a  two- 
story  frame  building  that  had  been  a  residence  in  Wabash 
Avenue  near  Thirty-ninth  Street  and  that  was  now  both 
a  residence  and  a  grocery  store.  The  apartment  upstairs, 
reached  by  a  stairway  at  the  side  of  the  grocery,  had  in 
the  five  years,  and  under  the  hand  of  Jane  Eberly,  be 
come  a  thing  of  beauty,  perfect  in  the  simplicity  and  com 
pleteness  of  its  appointment. 

The  two  women  were  the  daughters  of  a  farmer  who 
had  lived  in  one  of  the  middle  western  states  facing  the 
Mississippi  River.  Their  grandfather  had  been  a  noted 
man  in  the  state,  having  been  one  of  its  first  governors 
and  later  serving  it  in  the  senate  in  Washington.  There 
was  a  county  and  a  good-sized  town  named  for  him 
and  he  had  once  been  talked  of  as  a  vice-presidential 
possibility  but  had  died  at  Washington  before  the  con- 


154         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

vention  at  which  his  name  was  to  have  been  put  forward. 
His  one  son,  a  youth  of  great  promise,  went  to  West 
Point  and  served  brilliantly  through  the  Civil  War,  after 
ward  commanding  several  western  army  posts  and 
marrying  the  daughter  of  another  army  man.  His  wife, 
an  army  belle,  died  after  having  borne  him  the  two 
daughters. 

After  the  death  of  his  wife  Major  Eberly  began  drink 
ing,  and  to  get  away  from  the  habit  and  from  the  army 
atmosphere  where  he  had  lived  with  his  wife,  whom  he 
loved  intensely,  took  the  two  little  girls  and  returned 
to  his  home  state  to  settle  on  a  farm. 

About  the  county  where  the  two  girls  grew  to  woman 
hood  their  father,  Major  Eberly,  got  the  name  of  a 
character,  seeing  people  but  seldom  and  treating  rudely 
the  friendly  advances  of  his  farmer  neighbours.  He 
would  sit  in  the  house  for  days  poring  over  books,  of 
which  he  had  a  great  many,  and  hundreds  of  which 
were  now  on  open  shelves  in  the  apartment  of  the  two 
girls.  These  days  of  study,  during  which  he  would 
brook  no  intrusion,  were  followed  by  days  of  fierce  in 
dustry  during  which  he  led  team  after  team  to  the  field, 
ploughing  or  reaping  day  and  night  with  no  rest  except 
to  eat. 

At  the  edge  of  the  Eberly  farm  there  was  a  little 
wooden  country  church  surrounded  by  a  hay  field,  and  on 
Sunday  mornings  during  the  summer  the  ex-army  man 
was  always  to  be  found  in  the  field,  running  some  noisy, 
clattering  agricultural  implement  up  and  down  under 
the  windows  of  the  church  and  disturbing  the  worship 
of  the  country  folk;  in  the  winter  he  drew  a  pile  of  logs 
there  and  went  on  Sunday  mornings  to  split  firewood  un 
der  the  church  windows.  While  his  daughters  were 
small  he  was  several  times  haled  into  court  and  fined 
for  cruel  neglect  of  his  animals.  Once  he  locked  a  great 
herd  of  fine  sheep  in  a  shed  and  went  into  the  house 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  155 

and  stayed  for  days  intent  upon  his  books  so  that  many 
of  them  suffered  cruelly  for  want  of  food  and  water. 
When  he  was  taken  into  court  and  fined,  half  the  county 
came  to  the  trial  and  gloated  over  his  humiliation. 

To  the  two  girls  the  father  was  neither  cruel  nor 
kind,  leaving  them  largely  to  themselves  but  giving  them 
no  money,  so  that  they  went  about  in  dresses  made  over 
from  those  of  the  mother,  that  lay  piled  in  trunks  in 
the  attic.  When  they  were  small,  an  old  negro  woman, 
an  ex-servant  of  the  army  belle,  lived  with  and  mothered 
them,  but  when  Edith  was  a  girl  of  ten  this  woman  went 
off  home  to  Tennessee,  so  that  the  girls  were  thrown 
on  their  own  resources  and  ran  the  house  in  their  own 
way. 

Janet  Eberly  was,  at  the  beginning  of  her  friendship 
with  Sam,  a  slight  woman  of  twenty-seven  with  a  small 
expressive  face,  quick  nervous  fingers,  black  piercing 
eyes,  black  hair  and  a  way  of  becoming  so  absorbed  in 
the  exposition  of  a  book  or  the  rush  of  a  conversation 
that  her  little  intense  face  became  transfigured  and  her 
quick  fingers  clutched  the  arm  of  her  listener  while  her 
eyes  looked  into  his  and  she  lost  all  consciousness  of  his 
presence  or  of  the  opinions  he  may  have  expressed.  She 
was  a  cripple,  having  fallen  from  the  loft  of  a  barn  in 
her  youth  injuring  her  back  so  that  she  sat  all  day  in 
a  specially  made  reclining  wheeled  chair. 

Edith  was  a  stenographer,  working  in  the  office  of  a 
publisher  down  town,  and  Janet  trimmed  hats  for  a 
milliner  a  few  doors  down  the  street  from  the  house 
in  which  they  lived.  In  his  will  the  father  left  the  money 
from  the  sale  of  the  farm  to  Janet,  and  Sam  used  it, 
insuring  his  life  for  ten  thousand  dollars  in  her  name 
while  it  was  in  his  possession  and  handling  it  with  a  cau 
tion  entirely  absent  from  his  operations  with  the  money 
of  the  medical  student.  "Take  it  and  make  money  for 
me/'  the  little  woman  had  said  impulsively  one  evening 


156          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

shortly  after  the  beginning  of  their  acquaintance  and 
after  Jack  Prince  had  been  talking  flamboyantly  of  Sam's 
ability  in  affairs.  "What  is  the  good  of  having  a  talent 
if  you  do  not  use  it  to  benefit  those  who  haven't  it?" 

Janet  Eberly  was  an  intellect.  She  disregarded  all 
the  usual  womanly  points  of  view  and  had  an  attitude  of 
her  own  toward  life  and  people.  In  a  way  she  had  under 
stood  her  hard-driven,  grey-haired  father  and  during 
the  time  of  her  great  physical  suffering  they  had  built 
up  a  kind  of  understanding  and  affection  for  each  other. 
After  his  death  she  wore  a  miniature  of  him,  made  in 
his  boyhood,  on  a  chain  about  her  neck.  When  Sam 
met  her  the  two  immediately  became  close  friends,  sit 
ting  for  hours  in  talk  and  coming  to  look  forward  with 
great  pleasure  to  the  evenings  spent  together. 

In  the  Eberly  household  Sam  McPherson  was  a  bene 
factor,  a  wonder-worker.  In  his  hands  the  six  thousand 
dollars  was  bringing  two  thousand  a  year  into  the  house 
and  adding  immeasurably  to  the  air  of  comfort  and  good 
living  that  prevailed  there.  To  Janet,  who  managed  the 
house,  he  was  guide,  counsellor,  and  something  more 
than  friend. 

Of  the  two  women  it  was  the  strong  vigorous  Edith, 
with  the  reddish-brown  hair  and  the  air  of  physical  com 
pleteness  that  made  men  stop  to  look  at  her  on  the  street, 
who  first  became  Sam's  friend. 

Edith  Eberly  was  strong  of  body,  given  to  quick 
flashes  of  anger,  stupid  intellectually  and  hungry  to  the 
roots  of  her  for  wealth  and  a  place  in  the  world.  She 
had  heard,  through  Jack  Prince,  of  Sam's  money  making 
and  of  his  ability  and  prospects  and,  for  a  time,  had  de 
signs  upon  his  affections.  Several  times  when  they  were 
alone  together  she  gave  his  hand  a  characteristically  im 
pulsive  squeeze  and  once  upon  the  stairway  beside  the 
grocery  store  offered  him  her  lips  to  kiss.  Later  there 
sprang  up  between  her  and  Jack  Prince  a  passionate  love 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  157 

affair,  dropped  finally  by  Prince  through  fear  of  her 
violent  fits  of  anger.  After  Sam  had  met  Janet  Eberly 
and  had  become  her  loyal  friend  and  henchman  all  show 
of  affection  OF  even  of  interest  between  him  and  Edith 
was  at  an  end  and  the  kiss  upon  the  stairs  was  for 
gotten. 

Going  up  the  stairway  after  the  ride  in  the  cable  car 
Sam  stood  beside  Janet's  wheel  chair  in  the  room  at  the 
front  of  the  apartment  facing  Wabash  Avenue.  The 
chair  was  by  the  window  and  faced  an  open  coal  fire  in 
a  grate  she  had  had  built  into  the  wall  of  the  house. 
Outside,  through  an  open  arched  doorway,  Edith  moved 
noiselessly  about  taking  dishes  from  a  little  table.  He 
knew  that  after  a  time  Jack  Prince  would  come  and 
take  her  to  the  theatre,  leaving  Janet  and  him  to  finish 
their  talk. 

Sam  lighted  his  pipe  and  between  puffs  began  talking, 
making  a  statement  that  he  knew  would  arouse  her,  and 
Janet,  putting  her  hand  impulsively  on  his  shoulder,  be 
gan  tearing  the  statement  to  bits. 

"You  talk!"  she  broke  out.  "Books  are  not  full  of 
pretence  and  lies;  you  business  men  are — you  and  Jack 
Prince.  What  do  you  know  of  books?  They  are  the 
most  wonderful  things  in  the  world.  Men  sit  writing 
them  and  forget  to  lie,  but  you  business  men  never  for 
get.  You  and  books !  You  haven't  read  books,  not  real 
ones.  Didn't  my  father  know;  didn't  he  save  himself 
from  insanity  through  books  ?  Do  I  not,  sitting  here,  get 
the  real  feel  of  the  movement  of  the  world  through  the 
books  that  men  write  ?  Suppose  I  saw  those  men.  They 
would  swagger  and  strut  and  take  themselves  seriously 
just  like  you  or  Jack  or  the  grocer  down  stairs.  You 
think  you  know  what's  going  on  in  the  world.  Yx>u 
think  you  are  doing  things,  you  Chicago  men  of  money 
and  action  and  growth.  You  are  blind,  all  blind." 


158          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

The  little  woman,  a  light,  half  scorn,  half  amusement 
in  her  eyes,  leaned  forward  and  ran  her  fingers  through 
Sam's  hair,  laughing  down  into  the  astonished  face  he 
turned  up  to  her. 

"Oh,  I'm  not  afraid,  in  spite  of  what  Edith  and  Jack 
Prince  say  of  you,"  she  went  on  impulsively.  "I  like 
you  all  right  and  if  I  were  a  well  woman  I  should 
make  love  to  you  and  marry  you  and  then  see  to  it  there 
was  something  in  this  world  for  you  besides  money  and 
tall  buildings  and  men  and  machines  that  make  guns." 

Sam  grinned.  "You  are  like  your  father,  driving  the 
mowing  machine  up  and  down  under  the  church  win 
dows  on  Sunday  mornings,"  he  declared ;  "you  think  you 
could  remake  the  world  by  shaking  your  fist  at  it.  I 
should  like  to  go  and  see  you  fined  in  a  court  room  for 
starving  sheep." 

Janet,  closing  her  eyes  and  lying  back  in  her  chair, 
laughed  with  delight  and  declared  that  they  would  have 
a  splendid  quarrelsome  evening. 

After  Edith  had  gone  out,  Sam  sat  through  the  even 
ing  with  Janet,  listening  to  her  exposition  of  life  and 
what  she  thought  it  should  mean  to  a  strong  capable 
fellow  like  himself,  as  he  had  been  listening  ever  since 
their  acquaintanceship  began.  In  the  talk,  and  in  the 
many  talks  they  had  had  together,  talks  that  rang  in  his 
ears  for  years,  the  little  black-eyed  woman  gave  him  a 
glimpse  into  a  whole  purposeful  universe  of  thought  and 
action  of  which  he  had  never  dreamed,  introducing  him 
to  a  new  world  of  men:  methodical  hard-thinking  Ger 
mans,  emotional  dreaming  Russians,  analytical  coura 
geous  Norwegians,  Spaniards  and  Italians  with  their 
sense  of  beauty,  and  blundering,  hopeful  Englishmen 
wanting  so  much  and  getting  so  little;  so  that  at  the 
end  of  the  evening  he  went  out  of  her  presence  feeling 
strangely  small  and  insignificant  against  the  great  world 
background  she  had  drawn  for  him. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  159 

Sam  did  not  understand  Janet's  point  of  view.  It  was 
all  too  new  and  foreign  to  everything  life  had  taught 
him,  and  in  his  mind  he  fought  her  ideas  doggedly, 
clinging  to  his  own  concrete,  practical  thoughts  and  hopes, 
but  on  the  train  homeward  bound,  and  in  his  own  room 
later,  he  turned  over  and  over  in  his  mind  the  things 
she  had  said  and  tried  in  a  dim  way  to  grasp  the  bigness 
of  the  conception  of  human  life  she  had  got  sitting  in  a 
wheel  chair  and  looking  down  into  Wabash  Avenue. 

Sam  loved  Janet  Eberly.  No  word  of  that  had  ever 
passed  between  them  and  he  had  seen  her  hand  flash 
out  and  grasp  the  shoulder  of  Jack  Prince  when  she  was 
laying  down  to  him  some  law  of  life  as  she  saw  it,  as  it 
had  so  often  shot  out  and  grasped  his  own,  but  had  she 
been  able  to  spring  out  of  the  wheel  chair  he  should  have 
taken  her  hand  and  gone  with  her  to  the  clergyman  within 
the  hour  and  in  his  heart  he  knew  that  she  would  have 
gone  with  him  gladly. 

Janet  died  suddenly  during  the  second  year  of  Sam's 
work  for  the  gun  company  without  a  direct  declaration 
of  affection  from  him,  but  during  the  years  when  they 
were  much  together  he  thought  of  her  as  in  a  sense  his 
wife  and  when  she  died  he  was  desolate,  overdrinking 
night  after  night  and  wandering  aimlessly  through  the 
deserted  streets  during  hours  when  he  should  have  been 
asleep.  She  was  the  first  woman  who  ever  got  hold  of 
and  stirred  his  manhood,  and  she  awoke  something  in 
him  that  made  it  possible  for  him  later  to  see  life  with 
a  broadness  and  scope  of  vision  that  was  no  part  of 
the  pushing,  energetic  young  man  of  dollars  and  of  in 
dustry  who  sat  beside  her  wheeled  chair  during  the 
evenings  on  Wabash  Avenue. 

After  Janet's  death,  Sam  did  not  continue  his  friend 
ship  with  Edith,  but  turned  over  to  her  the  ten  thousand 
dollars  to  which  the  six  thousand  of  Janet's  money  had 
grown  in  his  hands  and  did  not  see  her  again. 


CHAPTER  IV 

ONE  night  in  April  Colonel  Tom  Rainey  of  the  great 
Rainey  Arms  Company  and  his  chief  lieutenant,  young 
Sam  McPherson,  treasurer  and  chairman  of  the  board 
of  directors  of  the  company,  slept  together  in  a  room  in 
a  St.  Paul  hotel.  It  was  a  double  room  with  two  beds, 
and  Sam,  lying  on  his  pillow,  looked  across  the  bed  to 
where  the  colonel's  paunch  protruding  itself  between  him 
and  the  light  from  a  long  narrow  window,  made  a  round 
hill  above  which  the  moon  just  peeped.  During  the 
evening  the  two  men  had  sat  for  several  hours  at  a  table 
in  the  grill  down  stairs  while  Sam  discussed  a  proposi 
tion  he  proposed  making  to  a  St.  Paul  jobber  the1  next 
day.  The  account  of  the  jobber,  a  large  one,  had  been 
threatened  by  Lewis,  the  Jew  manager  of  the  Edwards 
Arms  Company,  the  Rainey  Company's  only  important 
western  rival,  and  Sam  was  full  of  ideas  to  checkmate 
the  shrewd  trade  move  the  Jew  had  made.  At  the  table, 
the  colonel  had  been  silent  and  taciturn,  an  unusual  at 
titude  of  mind  for  him,  and  Sam  lay  in  bed  and  looked 
at  the  moon  gradually  working  its  way  over  the  undu 
lating  abdominal  hill,  wondering  what  was  in  his  mind. 
The  hill  dropped,  showing  the  full  face  of  the  moon, 
and  then  rose  again  obliterating  it. 

"Sam,  were  you  ever  in  love?"  asked  the  colonel,  with 
a  sigh. 

Sam  turned  and  buried  his  face  in  the  pillow  and  the 
white  covering  of  his  bed  danced  up  and  down.  "The 
old  fool,  has  it  come  to  that  with  him?"  he  asked  him 
self.  "After  all  these  years  of  single  life  is  he  going 
to  begin  running  after  women  now?" 

160 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  161 

He  did  not  answer  the  colonel's  question.  "There 
are  breakers  ahead  for  you,  old  boy,"  he  thought,  the 
figure  of  quiet  determined  little  Sue  Rainey,  the  colonel's 
daughter,  as  he  had  seen  her  on  the  rare  occasions  when 
he  had  dined  at  the  Rainey  home  or  she  had  come  into 
the  LaSalle  Street  offices,  coming  into  his  mind.  With 
a  quiver  of  enjoyment  of  the  mental  exercise,  he  tried 
to  imagine  the  colonel  as  a  swaggering  blade  among 
women. 

The  colonel,  oblivious  of  Sam's  mirth  and  of  his 
silence  regarding  his  experience  in  the  field  of  love,  be 
gan  talking,  making  amends  for  the  silence  in  the  grill. 
He  told  Sam  that  he  had  decided  to  take  to  himself  a 
new  wife,  and  confessed  that  the  view  of  the  matter 
his  daughter  might  take  worried  him.  "Children  are 
so  unfair,"  he  complained;  "they  forget  about  a  man's 
feelings  and  can't  realise  that  his  heart  is  still  young." 

With  a  smile  on  his  lips,  Sam  began  trying  to  pic 
ture  a  woman's  lying  in  his  place  and  looking  at  the 
moon  over  the  pulsating  hill.  The  colonel  continued  talk 
ing.  He  grew  franker,  telling  the  name  of  his  beloved 
and  the  circumstances  of  their  meeting  and  courtship. 
"She  is  an  actress,  a  working  girl,"  he  said  feelingly.  "I 
met  her  at  a  dinner  given  by  Will  Sperry  one  evening 
and  she  was  the  only  woman  there  who  did  not  drink 
wine.  After  the  dinner  we  went  for  a  drive  together  and 
she  told  me  of  her  hard  life,  of  her  fight  against  tempta 
tions,  and  of  her  brother,  an  artist,  she  is  trying  to  get 
started  in  the  world.  We  have  been  together  a  dozen 
times  and  have  written  letters,  and,  Sam,  we  have  dis 
covered  an  affinity  for  each  other." 

Sam  sat  up  in  bed.  "Letters!"  he  muttered.  "The 
old  dog  is  going  to  get  himself  involved."  He  dropped 
again  upon  the  pillow.  "Well,  let  him.  Why  need  I 
bother  myself?" 

The  colonel,  having  begun  talking,  could  not  stop. 


1 62          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

"Although  we  have  seen  each  other  only  a  dozen  times, 
a  letter  has  passed  between  us  every  day.  Oh,  if  you 
could  see  the  letters  she  writes.  They  are  wonderful." 

A  worried  sigh  broke  from  the  colonel.  "I  want  Sue 
to  invite  her  to  the  house,  but  I  am  afraid,"  he  com 
plained  ;  "I  am  afraid  she  will  be  wrong-headed  about  it. 
Women  are  such  determined  creatures.  She  and  my 
Luella  should  meet  and  know  each  other,  but  if  I  go 
home  and  tell  her  she  may  make  a  scene  and  hurt  Luella's 
feelings/' 

The  moon  had  risen,  shedding  its  light  in  Sam's  eyes, 
and  he  turned  his  back  to  the  colonel  and  prepared  to 
sleep.  The  naive  credulity  of  the  older  man  had  touched 
a  spring  of  mirth  in  him  and  from  time  to  time  the  cover 
ing  of  his  bed  continued  to  quiver  suggestively. 

"I  would  not  hurt  her  feelings  for  anything.  She  is 
the  squarest  little  woman  alive,"  the  voice  of  the  colonel 
announced.  The  voice  broke  and  the  colonel,  who  ha 
bitually  roared  forth  his  sentiments,  began  to  dither. 
Sam  wondered  if  his  feelings  had  been  touched  by  the 
thoughts  of  his  daughter  or  of  the  lady  from  the  stage. 
"It  is  a  wonderful  thing,"  half  sobbed  the  colonel,  "when 
a  young  and  beautiful  woman  gives  her  whole  heart  into 
the  keeping  of  a  man  like  me." 

It  was  a  week  later  before  Sam  heard  more  of  the 
affair.  Looking  up  from  his  desk  in  the  offices  in  La- 
Salle  Street  one  morning,  he  found  Sue  Rainey  stand 
ing  before  him.  She  was  a  small  athletic  looking  woman 
with  black  hair,  square  shoulders,  cheeks  browned  by 
the  sun  and  wind,  and  quiet  grey  eyes.  She  stood  fac 
ing  Sam's  desk  and  pulled  off  a  glove  while  she  looked 
down  at  him  with  amused  quizzical  eyes.  Sam  rose, 
and  leaning  over  the  flat-topped  desk,  took  her  hand, 
wondering  what  had  brought  her  there. 

Sue  Rainey  did  not  mince  matters,  but  plunged  at  once 
into  an  explanation  of  the  purpose  of  her  visit.  From 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          163 

birth  she  had  lived  in  an  atmosphere  of  wealth.  Al 
though  she  was  not  counted  a  beautiful  woman,  she  had, 
because  of  her  wealth  and  the  charm  of  her  person,  been 
much  courted.  Sam,  who  had  talked  briefly  with  her 
a  half  dozen  times,  had  long  had  a  haunting  curiosity 
to  know  more  of  her  personality.  As  she  stood  there 
before  him  looking  so  wonderfully  well-kept  and  con 
fident  he  thought  her  baffling  and  puzzling. 

"The  colonel,"  she  began,  and  then  hesitated  and 
smiled.  "You,  Mr.  McPherson,  have  become  a  figure 
in  my  father's  life.  He  depends  upon  you  very  much. 
He  tells  me  that  he  has  talked  with  you  concerning 
a  Miss  Luella  London  from  the  theatre,  and  that  you 
have  agreed  with  him  that  the  colonel  and  she  should 
marry." 

Sam  watched  her  gravely.  A  flicker  of  mirth  ran 
through  him,  but  his  face  was  grave  and  disinterested. 

"Yes?"  he  said,  looking  into  her  eyes.  "Have  you 
met  Miss  London?" 

"I  have,"  answered  Sue  Rainey.    "Have  you?" 

Sam  shook  his  head. 

"She  is  impossible,"  declared  the  colonel's  daughter, 
clutching  the  glove  held  in  her  hand  and  staring  at  the 
floor.  A  flush  of  anger  rose  in  her  cheeks.  "She  is  a 
crude,  hard,  scheming  woman.  She  colours  her  hair,  she 
cries  when  you  look  at  her,  she  hasn't  even  the  grace 
to  be  ashamed  of  what  she  is  trying  to  do,  and  she  has 
got  the  colonel  into  a  fix." 

Sam  looked  at  the  brown  of  Sue  Rainey 's  cheek  and 
thought  the  texture  of  it  beautiful.  He  wondered  why 
he  had  heard  her  called  a  plain  woman.  The  heightened 
colour  brought  to  her  face  by  her  anger  had,  he  thought, 
transfigured  her.  He  liked  her  direct  forceful  way  of 
putting  the  matter  of  the  colonel's  affair,  and  felt  keenly 
the  compliment  implied  by  her  having  come  to  him.  "She 
has  self-respect,"  he  told  himself,  and  felt  a  thrill  of 


1 64          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

pride  in  her  attitude  as  though  it  had  been  inspired  by 
himself. 

"I  have  been  hearing  of  you  a  great  deal,"  she  con 
tinued,  glancing  up  at  him  and  smiling.  "At  our  house 
you  are  brought  to  the  table  with  the  soup  and  taken 
away  with  the  liqueur.  My  father  interlards  his  table 
talk,  and  introduces  all  of  his  wise  new  axioms  on 
economy  and  efficiency  and  growth,  with  a  constant  pro 
cession  of  'Sams  says'  and  'Sam  thinks/  And  the  men 
who  come  to  the  house  talk  of  you  also.  Teddy  Foreman 
says  that  at  directors'  meetings  they  all  sit  about  like 
children  waiting  for  you  to  tell  them  what  to  do." 

She  threw  out  her  hand  with  an  impatient  little  ges 
ture.  "I  am  in  a  hole,"  she  said.  "I  might  handle  my 
father  but  I  can  not  handle  that  woman." 

While  she  had  been  talking  to  him  Sam  looked  past 
her  and  out  at  a  window.  When  her  eyes  wandered 
from  his  face  he  looked  again  at  her  brown  firm  cheeks. 
From  the  beginning  of  the  interview  he  had  been  intend 
ing  to  help  her. 

"Give  me  the  lady's  address,"  he  said;  "I'll  go  look 
her  over." 

Three  evenings  later  Sam  took  Miss  Luella  London 
to  a  midnight  supper  at  one  of  the  town's  best  restaurants. 
She  knew  the  motive  of  his  taking  her,  as  he  had  been 
quite  frank  in  the  few  minutes'  talk  near  the  stage  door 
of  the  theatre  when  the  engagement  was  made.  As  they 
ate,  they  talked  of  the  plays  at  the  Chicago  theatres, 
and  Sam  told  her  a  story  of  an  amateur  performance 
that  had  once  taken  place  in  the  hall  over  Geiger's  drug 
store  in  Caxton  when  he  was  a  boy.  In  the  performance 
Sam  had  taken  the  role  of  a  drummer  boy  killed  on  the 
field  of  battle  by  a  swaggering  villain  in  a  grey  uniform, 
and  John  Telfer,  in  the  role  of  villain,  had  become  so 
in  earnest  that,  a  pistol  not  exploding  at  a  critical  moment, 
he  had  chased  Sam  about  the  stage  trying  to  hit  him 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  165 

with  the  butt  of  the  weapon  while  the  audience  roared 
with  delight  at  the  realism  of  Telfer's  rage  and  at  the 
frightened  boy  begging  for  mercy. 

Luella  London  laughed  heartily  at  Sam's  story  and 
then,  the  coffee  being  served,  she  fingered  the  handle  of 
the  cup  and  a  shrewd  look  came  into  her  eyes. 

"And  now  you  are  a  big  business  man  and  have  come 
to  see  me  about  Colonel  Rainey,"  she  said. 

Sam  lighted  a  cigar. 

"Just  how  much  are  you  counting  on  this  marriage 
between  yourself  and  the  colonel?"  he  asked  bluntly. 

The  actress  laughed  and  poured  cream  into  her  coffee. 
A  line  came  and  went  on  her  forehead  between  her  eyes. 
Sam  thought  she  looked  capable. 

"I  have  been  thinking  of  what  you  told  me  at  the  stage 
door,"  she  said,  and  a  childlike  smile  played  about  her 
lips.  "Do  you  know,  Mr.  McPherson,  I  can't  just  figure 
you.  I  can't  just  see  how  you  get  into  this.  Where 
are  your  credentials,  anyway?" 

Sam,  keeping  his  eyes  upon  her  face,  took  a  jump  into 
the  dark. 

"It's  this  way,"  he  said,  "I'm  something  of  an  ad 
venturer  myself.  I  fly  the  black  flag.  I  come  from 
where  you  do.  I  had  to  reach  out  my  hand  and  take  what 
I  wanted.  I  do  not  blame  you  in  the  least,  but  it  just 
happens  that  I  saw  Colonel  Tom  Rainey  first.  He  is  my 
game  and  I  do  not  propose  to  have  you  fooling  around. 
I  am  not  bluffing.  You  have  got  to  get  off  him." 

Leaning  forward,  he  stared  at  her  intently,  and  then 
lowered  his  voice.  "I've  got  your  record.  I  know  the 
man  you  used  to  live  with.  He's  going  to  help  me  get 
you  if  you  do  not  drop  it." 

Sitting  back  in  his  chair  Sam  watched  her  gravely.  He 
had  taken  the  odd  chance  to  win  quickly  by  a  bluff  and 
had  won.  But  Luella  London  was  not  to  be  defeated 
without  a  struggle. 


1 66          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

"You  lie,"  she  cried,  half  springing  from  her  chair. 
"Frank  has  never " 

"Oh  yes,  Frank  has/'  answered  Sam,  turning  as  though 
to  call  a  waiter;  "I  will  have  him  here  in  ten  minutes  if 
you  wish  to  be  shown." 

Picking  up  a  fork  the  woman  began  nervously  pick 
ing  holes  in  the  table  cloth  and  a  tear  appeared  upon  her 
cheek.  She  took  a  handkerchief  from  a  bag  that  hung 
hooked  over  the  back  of  a  chair  at  the  side  of  the  table 
and  wiped  her  eyes. 

"All  right!  All  right!"  she  said,  bracing  herself, 
"I'll  drop  it.  If  you've  dug  up  Frank  Robson  you've 
got  me.  He'll  do  anything  you  say  for  a  piece  of 
money." 

For  some  minutes  the  two  sat  in  silence.  A  tired  look 
had  come  into  the  woman's  eyes. 

"I  wish  I  was  a  man,"  she  said.  "I  get  whipped  at 
everything  I  tackle  because  I'm  a  woman.  I'm  getting 
past  my  money-making  days  in  the  theatre  and  I  thought 
the  colonel  was  fair  game." 

"He  is,"  answered  Sam  dispassionately,  "but  you  see 
I  beat  you  to  it.  He's  mine." 

Glancing  cautiously  about  the  room,  he  took  a  roll  of 
bills  from  his  pocket  and  began  laying  them  one  at  a 
time  upon  the  table. 

"Look  here,"  he  said,  "you've  done  a  good  piece  of 
work.  You  should  have  won.  For  ten  years  half  the 
society  women  of  Chicago  have  been  trying  to  marry 
their  daughters  or  their  sons  to  the  Rainey  fortune.  They 
had  everything  to  help  them,  wealth,  good  looks,  and  a 
standing  in  the  world.  You  have  none  of  these  things. 
How  did  you  do  it? 

"Anyway,"  he  went  on,  "I'm  not  going  to  see  you 
trimmed.  I've  got  ten  thousand  dollars  here,  as  good 
Rainey  money  as  ever  was  printed.  You  sign  this  paper 
and  then  put  the  roll  in  your  purse." 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  167 

"That's  square,"  said  Luella  London,  signing,  and  with 
the  light  coming  back  into  her  eyes. 

Sam  beckoned  to  the  proprietor  of  the  restaurant 
whom  he  knew  and  had  him  and  a  waiter  sign  as  wit 
nesses. 

Luella  London  put  the  roll  of  bills  into  her  purse. 

"What  did  you  give  me  that  money  for  when  you 
had  me  beat  anyway?"  she  asked. 

Sam  lighted  a  fresh  cigar  and  folding  the  paper  put 
it  in  his  pocket. 

"Because  I  like  you  and  I  admire  your  skill,"  he 
said,  "and  anyway  I  did  not  have  you  beaten  until  right 


now." 


They  sat  studying  the  people  getting  up  from  the 
tables  and  going  through  the  door  to  waiting  carriages 
and  automobiles,  the  well-dressed  women  with  assured 
airs  serving  Sam's  mind  to  make  a  contrast  for  the 
woman  who  sat  with  him. 

"I  presume  you  are  right  about  women,"  he  said  mus 
ingly,  "it  must  be  a  stiff  game  for  you  if  you  like  win 
ning  on  your  own  hook." 

"Winning!  We  don't  win."  The  lips  of  the  actress 
drew  back  showing  her  white  teeth.  "No  woman  ever 
won  who  tried  to  play  a  straight  fighting  game  for  her 
self." 

Her  voice  grew  tense  and  the  lines  upon  her  fore 
head  reappeared. 

"Woman  can't  stand  alone,"  she  went  on,  "she  is 
a  sentimental  fool.  She  reaches  out  her  hand  to  some 
man  and  that  in  the  end  beats  her.  Why,  even  when 
she  plays  the  game  as  I  played  it  against  the  colonel 
some  rat  of  a  man  like  Frank  Robson,  for  whom  she 
has  given  up  everything  worth  while  to  a  woman,  sells 
her  out." 

Sam  looked  at  her  hand,  covered  with  rings,  lying 
on  the  table. 


i68          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

"Let's  not  misunderstand  each  other,"  he  said  quietly, 
"do  not  blame  Frank  for  this.  I  never  knew  him.  I  just 
imagined  him." 

A  puzzled  look  came  into  the  woman's  eyes  and  a 
flush  rose  in  her  cheeks. 

"You  grafter!"  she  sneered. 

Sam  called  to  a  passing  waiter  and  ordered  a  fresh 
bottle  of  wine. 

"What's  the  use  being  sore?"  he  asked.  "It's  simple 
enough.  You  staked  against  a  better  mind.  Anyway 
you  have  the  ten  thousand,  haven't  you?" 

Luella  reached  for  her  purse. 

"I  don't  know,"  she  said,  'Til  look.  Haven't  you  de 
cided  to  steal  it  back  yet?" 

Sam  laughed. 

"I'm  coming  to  that,"  he  said,  "don't  hurry  me." 

For  several  minutes  they  sat  eyeing  each  other,  and 
then,  with  an  earnest  ring  in  his  voice  and  a  smile  on 
his  lips,  Sam  began  talking  again. 

"Look  here!"  he  said,  "I'm  no  Frank  Robson  and  I 
do  not  like  giving  a  woman  the  worst  of  it.  I  have  been 
studying  you  and  I  can't  see  you  running  around  loose 
with  ten  thousand  dollars  of  real  money  on  you.  You 
do  not  fit  into  the  picture  and  the  money  will  not  last  a 
year  in  your  hands. 

"Give  it  to  me,"  he  urged;  "let  me  invest  it  for  you. 
I'm  a  winner.  I'll  double  it  for  you  in  a  year." 

The  actress  stared  past  Sam's  shoulder  to  where  a 
group  of  young  men  sat  about  a  table  drinking  and  talk 
ing  loudly.  Sam  began  telling  an  anecdote  of  an  Irish 
baggage  man  in  Caxton.  When  he  had  finished  he 
looked  at  her  and  laughed. 

"As  that  shoemaker  looked  to  Jerry  Donlin  so  you, 
as  the  colonel's  wife,  looked  to  me,"  he  said.  "I  had 
to  make  you  get  out  of  my  flower  bed." 

A  gleam  of  resolution  came  into  the  wandering  eyes 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  169 

of  Luella  London  and  she  took  the  purse  from  the 
back  of  the  chair  and  brought  out  the  roll  of  bills. 

"I'm  a  sport,"  she  said,  "and  I'm  going  to  lay  a  bet 
on  the  best  horse  I  ever  saw.  You  may  trim  me,  but  I 
always  would  take  a  chance. " 

Turning,  she  called  a  waiter  and,  handing  him  a  bill 
from  her  purse,  threw  the  roll  on  the  table. 

"Take  the  pay  for  the  spread  and  the  wine  we  have 
had  out  of  that,"  she  said,  handing  him  the  loose  bill 
and  then  turning  to  Sam.  "You  ought  to  beat  the  world. 
Anyway  your  genius  gets  recognition  from  me.  I  pay 
for  this  party  and  when  you  see  the  colonel  say  good-bye 
to  him  for  me." 

The  next  day,  at  his  request,  Sue  Rainey  called  at  the 
offices  of  the  Arms  Company  and  Sam  handed  her  the 
paper  signed  by  Luella  London.  It  was  an  agreement 
on  her  part  to  divide  with  Sam,  half  and  half,  any  money 
she  might  be  able  to  blackmail  out  of  Colonel  Rainey. 

The  colonel's  daughter  glanced  from  the  paper  to 
Sam's  face. 

"I  thought  so,"  she  said,  and  a  puzzled  look  came  into 
her  eyes.  "But  I  do  not  understand  this.  What  does  this 
paper  do  and  what  did  you  pay  for  it?" 

"The  paper,"  Sam  answered,  "puts  her  in  a  hole  and 
I  paid  ten  thousand  dollars  for  it." 

Sue  Rainey  laughed  and  taking  a  check  book  from 
her  handbag  laid  it  on  the  desk  and  sat  down. 

"Do  you  get  your  half?"  she  asked. 

"I  get  it  all,"  answered  Sam,  and  then  leaning  back 
in  his  chair  launched  into  an  explanation.  When  he 
had  told  her  of  the  talk  in  the  restaurant  she  sat  with  the 
checkbook  lying  before  her  and  with  the  puzzled  look 
still  in  her  eyes. 

Without  giving  her  time  for  comment  Sam  plunged 
into  the  midst  of  what  had  been  in  his  mind  to  say  to 
her. 


i yo          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

"The  woman  will  not  bother  the  colonel  any  more,"  he 
declared;  "if  that  paper  won't  hold  her  something  else 
will.  She  respects  me  and  she  is  afraid  of  me.  We  had 
a  talk  after  she  had  signed  the  paper  and  she  gave  me 
the  ten  thousand  dollars  to  invest  for  her.  I  promised 
to  double  it  for  her  within  a  year  and  I  want  to  make 
good.  I  want  you  to  double  it  now.  Make  the  check 
for  twenty  thousand." 

Sue  Rainey  wrote  the  check,  making  it  payable  to 
bearer,  and  pushed  it  across  the  table. 

"I  cannot  say  that  I  understand  yet,"  she  confessed. 
"Did  you  also  fall  in  love  with  her?" 

Sam  grinned.  He  was  wondering  whether  he  would 
be  able  to  get  into  words  just  what  he  wanted  to  tell  her 
of  the  actress  soldier  of  fortune.  He  looked  across  the 
table  at  her  frank  grey  eyes  and  then  on  an  impulse  de 
cided  that  he  would  tell  it  straight  out  as  though  she  had 
been  a  man. 

"It's  like  this,"  he  said.  "I  like  ability  and  good  brains 
and  that  woman  has  them.  She  isn't  a  good  woman,  but 
nothing  in  her  life  has  made  her  want  to  be  good.  All 
her  life  she  has  been  going  the  wrong  way,  and  now  she 
wants  to  get  on  her  feet  and  squared  around.  That's 
what  she  was  after  the  colonel  for.  She  did  not  want  to 
marry  him,  she  wanted  to  make  him  give  her  the  start 
she  was  after.  I  got  the  best  of  her  because  somewhere 
there  is  a  snivelling  little  whelp  of  a  man  who  has  taken 
all  the  good  and  the  fineness  out  of  her  and  who  now 
stands  ready  to  sell  her  out  for  a  few  dollars.  I  imagined 
there  would  be  such  a  man  when  I  saw  her  and  I  bluffed 
my  way  through  to  him.  But  I  do  not  want  to  whip  a 
woman,  even  in  such  an  affair,  through  the  cheapness 
of  some  man.  I  want  to  do  the  square  thing  by  her. 
That's  why  I  asked  you  to  make  that  check  for  twenty 
thousand." 

Sue  Rainey  rose  and  stood  by  the  desk  looking  down 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  171 

at  him.  He  was  thinking  how  wonderfully  clear  and 
honest  her  eyes. 

"And  what  about  the  colonel  ?"  she  asked.  "What  will 
he  think  of  all  this?" 

Sam  walked  around  the  desk  and  took  her  hand. 

"We'll  have  to  agree  not  to  consider  him,"  he  said. 
"We  really  did  that  you  know  when  we  started  this 
thing.  I  think  we  can  depend  upon  Miss  London's  put 
ting  the  finishing  touches  on  the  job." 

And  Miss  London  did.  She  sent  for  Sam  a  week  later 
and  put  twenty-five  hundred  dollars  into  his  hand. 

"That's  not  to  invest  for  me,"  she  said,  "that's  for 
yourself.  By  the  agreement  I  signed  with  you  we  were 
to  split  anything  I  got  out  of  the  colonel.  Well,  I  went 
light.  I  only  got  five  thousand  dollars." 

With  the  money  in  his  hand  Sam  stood  by  the  side  of 
a  little  table  in  her  room  looking  at  her. 

"What  did  you  tell  the  colonel?"  he  asked. 

"I  called  him  up  here  to  my  room  last  night  and  lying 
here  in  bed  I  told  him  that  I  had  just  discovered  I  was 
the  victim  of  an  incurable  disease.  I  told  him  that  within 
a  month  I  would  be  in  bed  for  keeps  and  asked  him  to 
marry  me  at  once  and  to  take  me  away  with  him  to  some 
quiet  place  where  I  could  die  in  his  arms." 

Coming  over  to  Sam,  Luella  London  put  a  hand  upon 
his  arm  and  laughed. 

"He  began  to  beg  off  and  make  excuses,"  she  went  on, 
"and  then  I  brought  out  his  letters  to  me  and  talked 
straight.  He  wilted  at  once  and  paid  the  five  thousand 
dollars  I  asked  for  the  letters  without  a  murmur.  I 
might  have  made  it  fifty  and  with  your  talent  you  ought 
to  get  all  he  has  in  six  months." 

Sam  shook  hands  with  her  and  told  her  of  his  success 
in  doubling  the  money  she  had  put  into  his  hands.  Then 
putting  the  twenty-five  hundred  dollars  in  his  pocket  he 
went  back  to  his  desk.  He  did  not  see  her  again  and 


172          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

when,  through  a  lucky  market  turn,  he  had  increased 
the  twenty  thousand  dollars  she  had  left  with  him  to 
twenty-five,  he  placed  it  in  the  hands  of  a  trust  com 
pany  for  her  and  forgot  the  incident.  Years  later  he 
heard  that  she  was  running  a  fashionable  dressmaking 
establishment  in  a  western  city. 

And  Colonel  Tom  Rainey,  who  had  for  months  talked 
of  nothing  but  factory  efficiency  and  of  what  he  and 
young  Sam  McPherson  were  going  to  do  in  the  way  of 
enlarging  the  business,  began  the  next  morning  a  tirade 
against  women  that  lasted  the  rest  of  his  life. 


CHAPTER  V 

SUE  RAINEY  had  long  touched  the  fancy  of  the  youths 
of  Chicago  society  who,  while  looking  at  her  trim 
little  figure  and  at  the  respectable  size  of  the  fortune  be 
hind  it,  were  yet  puzzled  and  disconcerted  by  her  atti 
tude  toward  themselves.  On  the  wide  porches  at  golf 
clubs,  where  young  men  in  white  trousers  lounged  and 
smoked  cigarettes,  and  in  the  down-town  clubs,  where 
the  same  young  men  spent  winter  afternoons  playing 
Kelly  pool,  they  spoke  of  her,  calling  her  an  enigma. 
"She'll  end  by  being  an  old  maid,"  they  declared,  and 
shook  their  heads  at  the  thought  of  so  good  a  connection 
dangling  loosely  in  the  air  just  without  their  reach.  From 
time  to  time,  one  of  the  young  men  tore  himself  loose 
from  the  group  that  contemplated  her,  and,  with  an 
opening  volley  of  books,  candy,  flowers  and  invitations  to 
theatres,  charged  down  upon  her,  only  to  have  the  youth 
ful  ardour  of  his  attack  cooled  by  her  prolonged  atti 
tude  of  indifference.  When  she  was  twenty-one,  a  young 
English  cavalry  officer,  who  came  to  Chicago  to  ride  in 
the  horse  show  had,  for  some  weeks,  been  seen  much  in 
her  company  and  a  report  of  their  engagement  had  been 
whispered  through  the  town  and  talked  of  about  the  nine 
teenth  hole  at  the  country  clubs.  The  rumour  proved  to 
be  without  foundation,  the  attraction  to  the  cavalry  offi 
cer  having  been  a  certain  brand  of  rare  old  wine  the  colo 
nel  had  stored  in  his  cellar  and  a  feeling  of  brotherhood 
with  the  swaggering  old  gun  maker,  rather  than  the 
colonel's  quiet  little  daughter. 

After  the  beginning  of  his  acquaintanceship  with  her, 

173 


174         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

and  all  during  the  days  when  he  stirred  things  up  in  the 
offices  and  shops  of  the  gun  company,  tales  of  the  as 
siduous  and  often  needy  young  men  who  were  camped 
on  her  trail  reached  Sam's  ears.  They  would  be  in  at 
the  office  to  see  and  talk  with  the  colonel,  who  had  sev 
eral  times  confided  to  Sam  that  his  daughter  Sue  was 
already  past  the  age  at  which  right-minded  young  women 
should  marry,  and  in  the  absence  of  the  father  two  or 
three  of  them  had  formed  a  habit  of  stopping  for  a  word 
with  Sam,  whom  they  had  met  through  the  colonel  or 
Jack  Prince.  They  declared  that  they  were  "squaring 
themselves  with  the  colonel."  Not  a  difficult  thing  to 
do,  Sam  thought,  as  he  drank  the  wine,  smoked  the  ci 
gars,  and  ate  the  dinners  of  all  without  prejudice.  Once, 
at  luncheon,  Colonel  Tom  discussed  these  young  men 
with  Sam,  pounding  on  a  table  so  that  the  glasses  jumped 
about,  and  calling  them  damned  upstarts. 

For  his  own  part,  Sam  did  not  feel  that  he  knew  Sue 
Rainey,  and  although,  after  their  first  meeting  one  eve 
ning  at  the  Rainey  house,  he  had  been  pricked  by  a  mild 
curiosity  concerning  her,  no  opportunity  to  satisfy  it 
had  presented  itself.  He  knew  that  she  was  athletic, 
travelled  much,  rode,  shot,  and  sailed  a  boat;  and  he 
had  heard  Jack  Prince  speak  of  her  as  a  woman  of 
brains,  but,  until  the  incident  of  the  Colonel  and  Luella 
London  threw  them  for  the  moment  into  the  same  enter 
prise  and  started  him  thinking  of  her  with  real  interest, 
he  had  seen  and  talked  with  her  for  but  brief  passing 
moments  brought  about  by  their  mutual  interest  in  the 
affairs  of  her  father. 

After  Janet  Eberly's  sudden  death,  and  while  he  was 
yet  in  the  midst  of  his  grief  at  her  loss,  Sam  had  his 
first  long  talk  with  Sue  Rainey.  It  was  in  Colonel  Tom's 
office,  and  Sam,  walking  hurriedly  in,  found  her  sitting 
at  the  Colonel's  desk  and  staring  out  of  the  window  at  a 
broad  expanse  of  flat  roofs.  A  man,  climbing  a  flag  pole 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  175 

to  replace  a  slipped  rope,  caught  his  attention  and  stand 
ing  by  the  window  looking  at  the  minute  figure  clinging 
to  the  swaying  pole,  he  began  talking  of  the  absurdity 
of  human  endeavour. 

The  Colonel's  daughter  listened  respectfully  to  his 
rather  obvious  banalities  and  getting  up  from  her  chair 
came  to  stand  beside  him.  Sam  turned  slyly  to  look  at 
her  firm  brown  cheeks  as  he  had  looked  on  the  morning 
when  she  had  come  to  see  him  about  Luella  London  and 
was  struck  by  the  thought  that  she  in  some  faint  way 
reminded  him  of  Janet  Eberly.  In  a  moment,  and  rather 
to  his  own  surprise,  he  burst  into  a  long  speech  telling 
of  Janet,  of  the  tragedy  of  her  loss  and  something  of 
the  beauty  of  her  life  and  character. 

The  nearness  of  his  loss  and  the  nearness  also  of  what 
he  thought  might  be  a  sympathetic  listener  spurred  him 
and  he  found  himself  getting  a  kind  of  relief  for  the 
aching  sense  of  loss  for  his  dead  comrade  by  heaping 
praises  upon  her  life. 

When  he  had  finished  saying  what  was  in  his  mind,  he 
stood  by  the  window  feeling  awkward  and  embarrassed. 
The  man  who  climbed  the  flag  pole  having  put  the  rope 
through  the  ring  at  the  top  slid  suddenly  down  the  pole 
and  thinking  for  the  moment  that  he  had  fallen  Sam 
made  a  quick  clutch  at  the  air  with  his  hand.  His  grip 
ping  fingers  closed  over  Sue  Rainey's  hand. 

He  turned,  amused  by  the  incident,  and  began  making 
a  halting  explanation.  There  were  tears  in  Sue  Rainey's 
eyes. 

"I  wish  I  had  known  her,"  she  said  and  drew  her  hand 
from  between  his  fingers  "I  wish  you  had  known  me 
better  that  I  also  might  have  known  your  Janet.  They 
are  rare — such  women.  They  are  worth  much  to  know. 
Most  women  like  most  men " 

She  made  an  impatient  gesture  with  her  hand  and  Sam, 
turning,  walked  toward  the  door.  He  felt  that  he  might 


176          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

not  trust  himself  to  answer  her.  For  the  first  time  since 
coming  to  manhood  he  felt  that  tears  might  at  any  mo 
ment  come  into  his  eyes.  Grief  for  the  loss  of  Janet 
surged  through  him  disconcerting  and  engulfing  him. 

"I  have  been  doing  you  an  injustice,"  said  Sue  Rainey, 
looking  at  the  floor.  "I  have  thought  of  you  as  some 
thing  different  from  what  you  are.  There  is  a  story  I 
heard  of  you  which  gave  me  a  wrong  impression." 

Sam  smiled.  Having  conquered  the  commotion  within 
himself,  he  laughed  and  explained  the  incident  of  the 
man  who  had  slid  down  the  pole. 

"What  was  the  story  you  heard?"  he  asked. 

"It  was  a  story  a  young  man  told  at  our  house,"  she 
explained  hesitatingly,  refusing  to  be  carried  away  from 
her  mood  of  seriousness.  "It  was  about  a  little  girl  you 
saved  from  drowning  and  a  purse  made  up  and  given 
you.  Why  did  you  take  the  money?" 

Sam  looked  at  her  squarely.  The  story  was  one  that 
Jack  Prince  had  delight  in  telling.  It  concerned  an  inci 
dent  of  his  early  business  life  in  the  city. 

One  afternoon,  when  he  was  still  in  the  employ  of 
the  commission  firm,  he  had  taken  a  party  of  men  for 
a  trip  on  an  excursion  steamer  on  the  lake.  He  had  a 
project  into  which  he  wanted  them  to  go  with  him  and 
had  taken  them  aboard  the  steamer  to  get  them  together 
and  present  the  merits  of  his  scheme.  During  the  trip 
a  little  girl  had  fallen  overboard  and  Sam,  springing  after 
her,  had  brought  her  safely  aboard  the  boat. 

On  the  excursion  steamer  a  cheer  had  arisen.  A  young 
man  in  a  broad-brimmed  cowboy  hat  ran  about  taking  up 
a  collection.  People  crowded  forward  to  grasp  Sam's 
hand  and  he  had  accepted  the  money  collected  and  had 
put  it  in  his  pocket. 

Among  the  men  aboard  the  boat  were  several  who, 
while  they  did  not  draw  back  from  going  into  Sam's 
project,  had  thought  his  taking  the  money  not  manly. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  177 

They  had  told  the  story,  and  it  had  come  to  the  ears  of 
Jack  Prince,  who  never  tired  of  repeating  it  and  always 
ended  the  story  with  the  request  that  the  listener  ask 
Sam  why  he  had  taken  the  money. 

Now  in  Colonel  Tom's  office  facing  Sue  Rainey,  Sam 
made  the  explanation  that  had  so  delighted  Jack  Prince. 

"The  crowd  wanted  to  give  me  the  money,"  he  said, 
slightly  perplexed.  "Why  shouldn't  I  have  taken  it?  I 
did  not  save  the  little  girl  for  the  money,  but  because  she 
was  a  little  girl;  and  the  money  paid  for  my  ruined 
clothes  and  the  expenses  of  the  trip." 

With  his  hand  on  the  doorknob  he  looked  steadily  at 
the  woman  before  him. 

"And  I  wanted  the  money,"  he  announced,  a  ring  of 
defiance  in  his  voice.  "I  have  always  wanted  money, 
any  money  I  could  get." 

Sam  went  back  to  his  own  office  and  sat  down  at  his 
desk.  He  had  been  surprised  by  the  cordiality  and  friend 
liness  Sue  Rainey  had  shown  toward  him.  On  an  im 
pulse,  he  wrote  a  letter,  defending  his  position  in  the  mat 
ter  of  the  money  taken  on  the  excursion  steamer  and  set 
ting  forth  something  of  the  attitude  of  his  mind  toward 
money  and  business  affairs. 

"I  cannot  see  myself  believing  in  the  rot  most  business 
men  talk,"  he  wrote  at  the  end  of  the  letter.  "They  are 
full  of  sentiment  and  ideals  which  are  not  true.  Having 
a  thing  to  sell  they  always  say  it  is  the  best,  although  it 
may  be  third  rate.  I  do  not  object  to  that.  What  I  do 
object  to  is  the  way  they  have  of  nursing  a  hope  within 
themselves  that  the  third  rate  thing  is  first  rate  until  the 
hope  becomes  a  belief.  In  the  talk  I  had  with  that  actress 
Luella  London  I  told  her  that  I  myself  flew  the  black 
flag.  Well,  I  do.  I  would  lie  about  goods  to  sell  them, 
but  I  would  not  lie  to  myself.  I  will  not  stultify  my  own 
mind.  If  a  man  crosses  swords  with  me  in  a  business 
deal  and  I  come  out  of  the  affair  with  the  money,  it  is 


1 78          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

no  sign  that  I  am  the  greater  rascal,  rather  it  is  a  sign 
that  I  am  the  keener  man." 

With  the  note  lying  before  him  on  the  desk  Sam  won 
dered  why  he  had  written  it.  It  seemed  to  him  an  ac 
curate  and  straightforward  statement  of  the  business 
creed  he  had  adopted  for  himself,  but  a  rather  absurd 
note  to  write  to  a  woman.  And  then,  not  allowing  him 
self  time  to  reconsider  his  action,  he  addressed  an  en 
velope  and  going  out  into  the  general  offices  dropped  it 
into  the  mail  chute. 

"It  will  let  her  know  where  I  stand  anyway,"  he 
thought,  with  a  return  of  the  defiant  mood  in  which  he 
had  told  her  the  motive  of  his  action  on  the  boat. 

Within  the  next  ten  days  after  the  talk  in  Colonel 
Tom's  office  Sam  saw  Sue  Rainey  several  times  coming 
to  or  going  from  her  father's  office.  Once,  meeting  in 
the  little  lobby  by  the  office  entrance,  she  stopped  and 
put  out  her  hand  which  Sam  took  awkwardly.  He  had 
a  feeling  that  she  would  not  have  regretted  an  oppor 
tunity  to  continue  the  sudden  little  intimacy  that  had 
sprung  up  between  them  in  the  few  minutes'  talk  of 
Janet  Eberly.  The  feeling  did  not  come  from  vanity 
but  from  a  belief  in  Sam  that  she  was  in  some  way  lonely 
and  wanting  companionship.  Although  she  had  been 
much  courted  she  lacked,  he  thought,  the  talent  for  com 
radeship  or  quick  friendliness.  "Like  Janet  she  is  more 
than  half  intellect,"  he  told  himself,  and  felt  a  pang  of 
regret  for  the  slight  disloyalty  of  the  further  thought 
that  there  was  in  Sue  a  something  more  substantial  and 
solid  than  there  had  been  in  Janet. 

Suddenly  Sam  began  wondering  whether  or  not  he 
would  like  to  marry  Sue  Rainey.  His  mind  played  with 
the  idea.  He  took  it  with  him  to  bed,  and  it  went  with 
him  all  day  in  his  hurried  trips  through  offices  and  shops. 
The  thought  having  come  to  him  persisted,  and  he  began 
seeing  her  in  a  new  light.  The  odd  half  awkward  little 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  179 

movements  of  her  hands,  and  their  expressiveness,  the 
brown  fine  texture  of  her  cheeks,  the  clearness  and  hon 
esty  of  her  grey  eyes,  the  quick  sympathy  and  under 
standing  of  his  feeling  for  Janet,  and  the  subtle  flattery 
of  the  notion  he  had  got  that  she  was  interested  in  him 
— all  of  these  things  came  and  went  in  his  mind  while  he 
ran  through  columns  of  figures  and  laid  plans  for  the 
expansion  of  the  business  of  the  Arms  Company.  Un 
consciously  he  began  to  make  her  a  part  of  his  plans  for 
the  future. 

Later,  Sam  discovered  that  during  the  days  after  the 
first  talk  together  the  thought  of  a  marriage  between  them 
was  in  Sue's  mind  also.  After  the  talk  she  went  home 
and  stood  for  an  hour  before  the  glass  studying  herself 
and  she  once  told  Sam  that  in  her  bed  that  night  she  shed 
tears  because  she  had  never  been  able  to  arouse  in  a  man 
the  note  of  tenderness  that  had  been  in  his  voice  when  he 
talked  to  her  of  Janet. 

And  then  two  months  after  the  first  talk  they  had  an 
other.  Sam,  who  had  not  allowed  his  grief  over  the 
loss  of  Janet  or  his  nightly  efforts  to  drown  the  sting  of 
it  in  hard  drinking,  to  check  the  big  forward  movement 
that  he  felt  he  was  getting  into  the  work  of  the  offices 
and  shops,  sat  one  afternoon  deeply  absorbed  in  a  pile 
of  factory  cost  sheets.  His  shirt  sleeves  were  rolled 
to  the  elbow,  showing  his  white  muscular  forearms.  He 
was  absorbed,  intent  upon  the  sheets. 

"I  stepped  in,"  said  a  voice  above  his  head. 

Glancing  up  quickly,  Sam  sprang  to  his  feet.  "She 
must  have  been  there  some  minutes  looking  down  at 
me,"  he  thought,  and  had  a  thrill  of  pleasure  in  the 
thought. 

Into  his  mind  came  the  contents  of  the  letter  he  had 
written  her,  and  he  wondered  if  after  all  he  had  been  a 
fool,  and  whether  the  thoughts  of  a  marriage  with  her 
were  but  vagaries.  "Perhaps  it  would  not  be  attractive 


i8o          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

to  either  her  or  myself  when  we  came  up  to  it,"  he  de 
cided. 

"I  stepped  in,"  she  began  again.  "I  have  been  think 
ing.  Some  things  you  said — in  the  letter  and  when  you 
talked  of  your  friend  Janet  who  died — some  things  of 
men  and  women  and  work.  You  may  not  remember 
them.  I — I  got  interested.  I — are  you  a  socialist?" 

"I  believe  not,"  Sam  answered,  wondering  what  had 
given  her  that  thought.  "Are  you?" 

She  laughed  and  shook  her  head. 

"Just  what  are  you?"  she  went  on.  "What  do  you 
believe?  I  am  curious  to  know.  I  thought  your 
note — you  will  pardon  me — I  thought  it  a  kind  of  pre 
tence." 

Sam  winced.  A  shadow  of  doubt  of  the  sincerity  of 
his  business  philosophy  crossed  his  mind  accompanied 
by  the  swaggering  figure  of  Windy  McPherson.  He 
came  around  the  desk  and  leaning  against  it  looked  at 
her.  His  secretary  had  gone  out  of  the  room  and  they 
were  alone  together.  Sam  laughed. 

"There  was  a  man  in  the  town  where  I  was  raised  used 
to  say  that  I  was  a  little  mole  working  underground, 
intent  upon  worms,"  he  said,  and  then,  waving  his  arms 
toward  the  papers  on  the  desk,  added,  "I  am  a  business 
man.  Isn't  that  enough?  If  you  could  go  with  me 
through  some  of  these  cost  sheets  you  would  agree  they 
are  needed." 

He  turned  and  faced  her  again. 

"What  should  I  be  doing  with  beliefs?"  he  asked. 

"Well,  I  think  you  have  them — some  kind  of  beliefs," 
she  insisted,  "you  must  have  them.  You  get  things  done. 
You  should  hear  the  men  talk  of  you.  Sometimes  at  the 
house  they  are  quite  foolish  about  what  a  wonderful 
fellow  you  are  and  what  you  are  doing  here.  They  say 
that  you  drive  on  and  on.  What  drives  you  ?  I  want  to 
know." 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  181 

For  the  moment  Sam  half  suspected  that  she  was  se 
cretly  laughing  at  him.  Finding  her  quite  serious  he 
started  to  reply  and  then  stopped,  regarding  her. 

The  silence  between  them  went  on  and  on.  A  clock 
on  the  wall  ticked  loudly. 

Sam  stepped  nearer  to  her  and  stood  looking  down  into 
the  face  she  slowly  turned  up  to  his. 

"I  want  to  have  a  talk  with  you,"  he  said,  and  his 
voice  broke.  He  had  the  illusion  of  a  hand  gripping  at 
his  throat. 

In  a  flash  he  had  definitely  decided  that  he  would  try 
to  marry  her.  Her  interest  in  the  motives  of  his  life 
had  clinched  the  sort  of  half  decision  he  had  made.  In 
an  illuminating  moment  during  the  prolonged  silence  be 
tween  them  he  had  seen  her  in  a  new  light.  The  feeling 
of  vague  intimacy  brought  to  him  by  his  thoughts  of 
her  became  a  fixed  belief  that  she  belonged  to  him — 
was  a  part  of  him — and  he  was  charmed  with  her  man 
ner,  and  her  person,  standing  there,  as  with  a  gift  given 
him. 

And  then  into  his  mind  came  a  hundred  other  thoughts, 
clamouring  thoughts,  come  out  of  the  hidden  parts  of 
him.  He  began  to  think  that  she  could  lead  the  way  on 
a  road  he  wanted  to  travel.  He  thought  of  her  wealth 
and  what  it  would  mean  to  a  man  filled  with  his  hunger 
for  power.  And  through  these  thoughts  shot  others. 
Something  in  her  had  taken  hold  of  him — something  that 
had  been  also  in  Janet.  He  was  curious  concerning  her 
curiosity  about  his  beliefs,  and  wanted  to  question  her 
concerning  her  own  beliefs.  He  could  see  none  of  Colo 
nel  Tom's  blustering  incompetence  in  her  and  thought 
her  filled  with  truth  as  a  deep  spring  is  filled  with  clear 
water.  He  believed  she  would  give  him  something, 
something  that  all  his  life  he  had  been  wanting.  An  old 
aching  hunger  that  had  haunted  his  nights  as  a  boy  came 
back  and  he  thought  that  at  her  hand  it  might  be  fed. 


1 82          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

"I — I  must  read  a  book  about  socialism,"  he  said 
lamely. 

Again  they  stood  in  silence,  she  looking  at  the  floor, 
he  past  her  head  and  out  at  the  window.  He  could  not 
bring  himself  to  speak  again  of  the  proposed  talk.  He 
had  a  boyish  dread  of  having  her  notice  the  tremor  in 
his  voice. 

Colonel  Tom  came  into  the  room,  bursting  with  an 
idea  Sam  had  given  him  at  the  lunch  hour  and  which 
in  working  its  way  into  his  mind  had  become  to  the 
colonel's  entirely  honest  belief  an  idea  of  his  own.  The 
interruption  brought  to  Sam  an  intense  feeling  of  relief 
and  he  began  talking  of  the  colonel's  idea  as  though  it 
had  taken  him  unawares. 

Sue,  walking  to  a  window,  began  tying  and  untying 
the  curtain  cord.  When  Sam,  raising  his  eyes,  looked 
at  her,  he  caught  her  eyes  watching  him  intently  and  she 
smiled,  continuing  to  look  at  him  squarely.  It  was  his 
eyes  that  first  broke  away. 

From  that  day  Sam's  mind  was  afire  with  thoughts 
of  Sue  Rainey.  In  his  room  he  sat,  or  going  into  Grant 
Park  stood  by  the  lake,  looking  at  the  silent  moving 
water  as  he  had  looked  in  the  days  when  he  first  came 
to  the  city.  He  did  not  dream  of  having  her  in  his  arms 
or  of  kissing  her  lips ;  he  thought,  instead,  with  a  glowing 
heart,  of  a  life  lived  with  her.  He  wanted  to  walk  be 
side  her  through  the  streets,  to  have  her  come  suddenly 
in  at  his  office  door,  to  look  into  her  eyes  and  to  have  her 
question  him,  as  she  had  questioned,  concerning  his  be 
liefs  and  his  hopes.  He  thought  that  in  the  evening  he 
would  like  to  go  to  a  house  of  his  own  and  find  her  sit 
ting  there  waiting  for  him.  All  the  charm  of  his  aim 
less  half -dissolute  way  of  life  died  in  him,  and  he  be 
lieved  that  with  her  he  could  begin  to  live  more  fully 
and  completely.  From  the  moment  when  he  had  defi 
nitely  decided  that  he  wanted  Sue  as  a  wife,  Sam  stopped 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  183 

overdrinking,  going  to  his  room  or  walking  through  the 
streets  or  in  the  parks  instead  of  seeking  his  old  compan 
ions  in  the  clubs  and  drinking  places.  Sometimes  push 
ing  his  bed  to  the  window  overlooking  the  lake,  he  would 
undress  immediately  after  dinner  and  opening  the  win 
dow  would  spend  half  the  night  watching  the  lights  of 
boats  far  away  over  the  water  and  thinking  of  her.  He 
would  imagine  her  in  the  room,  moving  here  and  there, 
and  coming  occasionally  to  put  her  hand  in  his  hair  and 
look  down  at  him  as  Janet  had  done,  helping  by  her  sane 
talk  and  quiet  ways  to  get  his  life  straightened  out  for 
good  living. 

And  when  he  had  fallen  asleep  the  face  of  Sue  Rainey 
came  to  visit  his  dreams.  One  night  he  thought  she  had 
become  blind  and  sat  in  the  room  with  sightless  eyes 
saying  over  and  over  like  one  demented,  "Truth,  truth, 
give  me  back  the  truth  that  I  may  see,"  and  he  awoke  sick 
with  horror  at  the  thought  of  the  look  of  suffering  that 
had  been  in  her  face.  Never  did  Sam  dream  of  having 
her  in  his  arms  or  of  raining  kisses  on  her  lips  and  neck 
as  he  had  dreamed  of  other  women  who  in  the  past  had 
won  his  favour. 

For  all  that  he  thought  of  her  so  constantly  and  built 
so  confidently  his  dream  of  a  life  to  be  spent  with  her, 
months  passed  before  he  saw  her  again.  Through  Colo 
nel  Tom  he  learned  that  she  had  gone  for  a  visit  to  the 
East  and  he  went  earnestly  about  his  work,  keeping  his 
mind  on  his  business  during  the  day  and  only  in  the  eve 
ning  allowing  himself  to  become  absorbed  in  thoughts 
of  her.  He  had  a  feeling  that  although  he  had  said 
nothing  she  knew  of  his  desire  for  her  and  that  she  wanted 
time  to  think  it  over.  Several  times  in  the  evening  in  his 
room  he  wrote  her  long  letters  filled  with  minute  boyish 
explanations  of  his  thoughts  and  motives,  letters  which 
after  writing  he  immediately  destroyed.  A  woman  of 
the  west  side,  with  whom  he  had  once  had  an  affair, 


1 84          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

met  him  one  day  on  the  street,  and  put  her  hand  fa 
miliarly  on  his  arm  and  for  the  moment  reawakened  in 
him  an  old  desire.  After  leaving  her  he  did  not  go  back 
to  the  office,  but  taking  a  south-bound  car,  spent  the  af 
ternoon  walking  in  Jackson  Park,  watching  the  children 
at  play  on  the  grass,  sitting  on  benches  under  the  trees, 
getting  out  of  his  body  and  his  mind  the  insistent  call 
of  the  flesh  that  had  come  back  to  him. 

Then  in  the  evening,  he  came  suddenly  upon  Sue 
riding  a  spirited  black  horse  in  a  bridle  path  at  the  up 
per  end  of  the  park.  It  was  just  at  the  grey  beginning 
of  night.  Stopping  the  horse,  she  sat  looking  at  him 
and  going  to  her  he  put  a  hand  on  the  bridle. 

"We  might  have  that  talk,"  he  said. 

She  smiled  down  at  him  and  the  colour  began  to  rise 
in  her  brown  cheeks. 

"I  have  been  thinking  of  it,"  she  said,  the  familiar 
serious  look  coming  into  her  eyes.  "After  all  what  have 
we  to  say  to  each  other  ?" 

Sam  watched  her  steadily. 

"I  have  a  lot  of  things  to  say  to  you,"  he  announced. 
"That  is  to  say — well — I  have,  if  things  are  as  I  hope." 
She  got  off  the  horse  and  they  stood  together  by  the  side 
of  the  path.  Sam  never  forgot  the  few  minutes  of  si 
lence  that  followed.  The  wide  prospects  of  green  sward, 
the  golf  player  trudging  wearily  toward  them  through 
the  uncertain  light,  his  bag  upon  his  shoulder,  the  air  of 
physical  fatigue  with  which  he  walked,  bending  slightly 
forward,  the  faint,  soft  sound  of  waves  washing  over  a 
low  beach,  and  the  intense  waiting  look  on  the  face  she 
turned  up  to  him,  made  an  impression  on  his  mind  that 
stayed  with  him  through  life.  It  seemed  to  him  that 
he  haa  arrived  at  a  kind  of  culmination,  a  starting  point, 
and  that  all  the  vague  shadowy  uncertainties  that  had,  in 
reflective  moments,  flitted  through  his  mind,  were  to  be 
brushed  away  by  some  act,  some  word,  from  the  lips  of 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  185 

this  woman.  With  a  rush  he  realised  how  consistently 
he  had  been  thinking  of  her  and  how  enormously  he  had 
been  counting  on  her  falling  in  with  his  plans,  and  the 
realisation  was  followed  by  a  sickening  moment  of  fear. 
How  little  he  actually  knew  of  her  and  of  her  way  of 
thought.  What  assurance  had  he  that  she  would  not 
laugh,  jump  back  upon  the  horse  and  ride  away?  He 
was  afraid  as  he  had  never  been  afraid  before.  Dumbly 
his  mind  groped  about  for  a  way  to  begin.  Expressions 
he  had  caught  and  noted  in  her  strong  serious  little  face 
when  he  had  achieved  but  a  mild  curiosity  concerning 
her  came  back  to  visit  his  mind  and  he  tried  desperately 
to  build  an  instant  idea  of  her  from  these.  And  then 
turning  his  face  from  her  he  plunged  directly  into  his 
thoughts  of  the  past  months  as  though  she  had  been  shar 
ing  them  with  him. 

"I  have  been  thinking  we  might  marry,  you  and  I," 
he  said,  and  cursed  himself  for  the  blundering  bluntness 
of  the  declaration. 

"You  do  get  things  done,  don't  you  ?"  she  replied,  smil 
ing.  "Why  should  you  have  been  thinking  anything  of 
the  sort?" 

"Because  I  want  to  live  with  you,"  he  said;  "I  have 
been  talking  to  the  Colonel." 

"About  marrying  me?"  She  seemed  about  to  begin 
laughing. 

He  hurried  on.  "No  not  that.  We  talked  about  you. 
I  could  not  let  him  alone.  He  might  have  known.  I 
kept  making  him  talk.  I  made  him  tell  me  about  your 
ideas.  I  felt  I  had  to  know." 

Sam  faced  her. 

"He  thinks  your  ideas  absurd.  I  do  not.  I  lika^hem. 
I  like  you.  I  think  you  are  beautiful.  I  do  not^mow 
whether  I  love  you  or  not,  but  for  weeks  I  have  been 
thinking  of  you  and  clinging  to  you  and  saying  over  and 
over  to  myself,  'I  want  to  live  my  life  with  Sue  Rainey.' 


1 86         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

I  did  not  expect  to  go  at  it  this  way.  You  know  me. 
What  you  do  not  know  I  will  tell  you." 

"Sam  McPherson,  you  are  a  wonder,"  she  said,  "and 
I  do  not  know  but  that  I  will  marry  you  in  the  end,  but  I 
can't  tell  now.  I  want  to  know  a  lot  of  things.  I  want 
to  know  if  you  are  ready  to  believe  what  I  believe  and  to 
live  for  what  I  want  to  live." 

The  horse,  growing  restless,  began  tugging  at  the 
bridle  and  she  spoke  to  him  sharply.  She  plunged  into  a 
description  of  a  man  she  had  seen  on  the  lecture  platform 
during  her  visit  to  the  East  and  Sam  looked  at  her  with 
puzzled  eyes. 

"He  was  beautiful,"  she  said.  "He  was  past  sixty  but 
looked  like  a  boy  of  twenty-five,  not  in  his  body,  but  in 
an  air  of  youth  that  hung  over  him.  He  stood  there 
before  the  people  talking,  quiet,  able,  efficient.  He  was 
clean.  He  had  lived  clean,  body  and  mind.  He  had 
been  companion  and  co-worker  with  William  Morris, 
and  once  he  had  been  a  mine  boy  in  Wales,  but  he  had 
got  hold  of  a  vision  and  lived  for  it.  I  did  not  hear  what 
he  said,  but  I  kept  thinking,  'I  want  a  man  like  that.' 

"Can  you  accept  my  beliefs  and  live  for  what  I  want 
to  live?"  she  persisted. 

Sam  looked  at  the  ground.  It  seemed  to  him  that  he 
was  going  to  lose  her,  that  she  would  not  marry  him. 

"I  am  not  accepting  beliefs  or  ends  in  life  blindly," 
he  said  stoutly,  "but  I  want  them.  What  are  your  be 
liefs?  I  want  to  know.  I  think  I  haven't  any  myself. 
When  I  reach  for  them  they  are  gone.  My  mind  shifts 
and  changes.  I  want  something  solid.  I  like  solid  things. 
I  want  you." 

"When  can  we  meet  and  talk  everything  over  thor 
oughly?" 

"Now,"  answered  Sam  bluntly,  some  look  in  her  face 
changing  his  whole  viewpoint.  Suddenly  it  seemed  as 
though  a  door  had  been  opened,  letting  in  a  strong  light 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  187 

upon  the  darkness  of  his  mind.  His  confidence  had  come 
back  to  him.  He  wanted  to  strike  and  keep  on  striking. 
The  blood  rushed  through  his  body  and  his  brain  began 
working  rapidly.  He  felt  sure  of  ultimate  success. 

Taking  her  hand,  and  leading  the  horse,  he  began 
walking  with  her  along  the  path.  Her  hand  trembled  in 
his  and  as  though  answering  a  thought  in  his  mind  she 
looked  up  at  him  and  said, 

"I  am  not  different  from  other  women,  although  I  do 
not  accept  your  offer.  This  is  a  big  moment  for  me,  per 
haps  the  biggest  moment  of  my  life.  I  want  you  to  know 
that  I  feel  that,  though  I  do  want  certain  things  more 
than  I  want  you  or  any  other  man." 

There  was  a  suggestion  of  tears  in  her  voice  and  Sam 
had  a  feeling  that  the  woman  in  her  wanted  him  to  take 
her  into  his  arms,  but  something  within  him  told  him  to 
wait  and  to  help  her  by  waiting.  Like  her  he  wanted 
something  more  than  the  feel  of  a  woman  in  his  arms. 
Ideas  rushed  through  his  head;  he  thought  that  she  was 
going  to  give  him  some  bigger  idea  than  he  had  known. 
The  figure  she  had  drawn  for  him  of  the  old  man  who. 
stood  on  the  platform,  young  and  beautiful,  the  old  boy 
ish  need  of  a  purpose  in  life,  the  dreams  of  the  last  few 
weeks — all  of  these  were  a  part  of  the  eager  curiosity  in 
him.  They  were  like  hungry  little  animals  waiting  to  be 
fed.  "We  must  have  it  all  out  here  and  now,"  he  told 
himself.  "I  must  not  let  myself  be  swept  away  by  a  rush 
of  feeling  and  I  must  not  let  her  be. 

"Do  not  think,"  he  said,  "that  I  haven't  tenderness  for 
you.  I  am  filled  with  it.  But  I  want  to  have  our  talk. 
I  want  to  know  what  you  expect  me  to  believe  and  how 
you  want  me  to  live." 

He  felt  her  hand  stiffen  in  his. 

"Whether  or  not  we  are  worth  while  to  each  other," 
she  added. 

"Yes,"  he  said. 


i88          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

And  then  she  began  to  talk,  telling  him  in  a  quiet  steady 
voice  that  steadied  something  in  him  what  she  wanted 
to  make  out  of  her  life.  Her  idea  was  one  of  service 
to  mankind  through  children.  She  had  seen  girl  friends 
of  hers,  with  whom  she  had  gone  to  school,  grow  up  and 
marry.  They  had  wealth  and  education,  fine  well-trained 
bodies,  and  they  had  been  married  only  to  live  lives  more 
fully  devoted  to  pleasure.  One  or  two  who  had  married 
poor  men  had  only  done  so  to  satisfy  a  passion  in  them 
selves,  and  after  marriage  had  joined  the  others  in  the 
hungry  pursuit  of  pleasure. 

"They  do  nothing  at  all,"  she  said,  "to  repay  the  world 
for  the  things  given  them,  the  wealth  and  well-trained 
bodies  and  the  disciplined  minds.  They  go  through  life 
day  after  day  and  year  after  year  wasting  themselves 
and  come  in  the  end  to  nothing  but  indolent,  slovenly 
vanity." 

She  had  thought  it  all  out  and  had  tried  to  plan  for 
herself  a  life  with  other  ends,  and  wanted  a  husband 
in  accord  with  her  ideas. 

"That  isn't  so  difficult,"  she  said,  "I  can  find  a  man 
whom  I  can  control  and  who  will  believe  as  I  believe. 
My  money  gives  me  that  power.  But  I  want  him  to  be 
a  real  man,  a  man  of  ability,  a  man  who  does  things  for 
himself,  one  fitted  by  his  life  and  his  achievements  to  be 
the  father  of  children  who  do  things.  And  so  I  began 
thinking  about  you.  I  got  the  men  who  come  to  the 
house  to  talk  of  you." 

She  hung  her  head  and  laughed  like  a  bashful  boy. 

"I  know  much  of  the  story  of  your  early  life  out  in 
that  Iowa  town,"  she  said.  "I  got  the  story  of  your  life 
and  your  achievements  out  there  from  some  one  who 
knew  you  well." 

The  idea  seemed  wonderfully  simple  and  beautiful  to 
Sam.  It  seemed  to  add  tremendously  to  the  dignity  and 
nobility  of  his  feeling  for  her.  He  stopped  in  the  path 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  189 

and  swung  her  about  facing  him.  They  were  alone  in 
that  end  of  the  park.  The  soft  darkness  of  the  summer 
night  had  settled  over  them.  In  the  grass  at  their  feet 
a  cricket  sang  loudly.  He  made  a  movement  to  take  her 
into  his  arms. 

"It  is  wonderful,"  he  said. 

"Wait,"  she  demanded,  putting  her  hand  against  his 
shoulder.  "It  isn't  so  simple.  I  am  wealthy.  You  are 
able  and  you  have  a  kind  of  undying  energy  in  you.  I 
want  to  give  both  my  wealth  and  your  ability  to  chil 
dren — our  children.  That  will  not  be  easy  for  you.  It 
means  giving  up  your  dreams  of  power.  Perhaps  I  shall 
lose  courage.  Women  do  after  two  or  three  have  come. 
You  will  have  to  furnish  that.  You  will  have  to  make  a 
mother  of  me  and  keep  making  a  mother  of  me.  You 
will  have  to  be  a  new  kind  of  father  with  something  ma 
ternal  in  you.  You  will  have  to  be  patient  and  studious 
and  kind.  You  will  have  to  think  of  these  things  at  night 
instead  of  thinking  of  your  own  advancement.  You  will 
have  to  live  wholly  for^me  because  I  am  to  be  their 
mother,  giving  me  your  strength  and  courage  and  your 
good  sane  outlook  on  things.  And  then  when  they  come 
you  will  have  to  give  all  these  things  to  them  day  after 
day  in  a  thousand  little  ways." 

Sam  took  her  into  his  arms  and  for  the  first  time  in  his 
memory  the  hot  tears  stood  in  his  eyes. 

The  horse,  unattended,  wheeled,  threw  up  his  head  and 
trotted  off  down  the  path.  They  let  him  go,  walking 
along  after  him  hand  in  hand  like  two  happy  children. 
At  the  entrance  to  the  park  they  came  up  to  him,  held 
by  a  park  policeman.  She  got  on  the  horse  and  Sam 
stood  beside  her  looking  up. 

"I'll  tell  the  Colonel  in  the  morning,"  he  said. 

"What  will  he  say  ?"  she  murmured,  musingly. 

"Damned  ingrate,"  Sam  mimicked  the  Colonel's  blus 
tering  throat  tones. 


190         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

She  laughed  and  picked  up  the  reins.  Sam  laid  his 
hand  on  hers. 

"How  soon?"  he  asked. 

She  put  her  head  down  near  his. 

"We'll  waste  no  time,"  she  said,  blushing. 

And  then  in  the  presence  of  a  park  policeman,  in  the 
street  by  the  entrance  to  the  park  with  the  people  passing 
up  and  down,  Sam  had  his  first  kiss  from  Sue  Rainey's 
lips. 

After  she  rode  away  Sam  walked.  He  had  no  sense  of 
the  passing  of  time,  wandering  through  street  after  street, 
rearranging  and  readjusting  his  outlook  on  life.  What 
she  had  said  had  stirred  every  vestige  of  sleeping  nobility 
in  him.  He  thought  that  he  had  got  hold  of  the  thing 
he  had  unconsciously  been  seeking  all  his  life.  His 
dreams  of  control  of  The  Rainey  Arms  Company  and  the 
other  big  things  he  had  planned  in  business  seemed,  in 
the  light  of  their  talk,  so  much  nonsense  and  vanity.  "I 
will  live  for  this!  I  will  live  for  this!"  he  kept  saying 
over  and  over  to  himself.  He  imagined  he  could  see  the 
little  white  things  lying  in  Sue's  arms,  and  his  new  love 
for  her  and  for  what  they  were  to  accomplish  together 
ran  through  him  and  hurt  him  so  that  he  felt  like  shout 
ing  in  the  darkened  streets.  He  looked  up  at  the  sky  and 
saw  the  stars  and  thought  they  looked  down  on  two 
new  and  glorious  beings  living  on  the  earth. 

At  a  corner  he  turned  and  came  into  a  quiet  residence 
street  where  frame  houses  stood  in  the  midst  of  little 
green  lawns  and  thoughts  of  his  boyhood  in  the  Iowa 
town  came  back  to  him.  And  then  his  mind  moving 
forward,  he  remembered  nights  in  the  city  when  he  had 
stolen  away  to  the  arms  of  women.  Hot  shame  burned 
in  his  cheeks  and  his  eyes  felt  hot. 

"I  must  go  to  her — I  must  go  to  her  at  her  house — 
now — to-night — and  tell  her  all  of  these  things,  and 
beg  her  to  forgive  me/'  he  thought. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  191 

And  then  the  absurdity  of  such  a  course  striking  him 
he  laughed  aloud. 

"It  cleanses  me !  this  cleanses  me !"  he  said  to  himself. 

He  remembered  the  men  who  had  sat  about  the  stove 
in  Wildman's  grocery  when  he  was  a  boy  and  the  stories 
they  sometimes  told.  He  remembered  how  he,  as  a  boy 
in  the  city,  had  run  through  the  crowded  streets  fleeing 
from  the  terror  of  lust.  He  began  to  understand  how 
distorted,  how  strangely  perverted,  his  whole  attitude 
toward  women  and  sex  had  been.  "Sex  is  a  solution, 
not  a  menace — it  is  wonderful,"  he  told  himself  without 
knowing  fully  the  meaning  of  the  word  that  had  sprung  to 
his  lips. 

When,  at  last,  he  turned  into  Michigan  Avenue  and 
went  toward  his  apartment,  the  late  moon  was  just  mount 
ing  the  sky  and  a  clock  in  one  of  the  sleeping  houses  was 
striking  three. 


CHAPTER   VI 

ONE  evening,  six  weeks  after  the  talk  in  the  gathering 
darkness  in  Jackson  Park,  Sue  Rainey  and  Sam  Mc- 
Pherson  sat  on  the  deck  of  a  Lake  Michigan  steamer 
watching  the  lights  of  Chicago  blink  out  in  the  distance. 
They  had  been  married  that  afternoon  in  Colonel  Tom's 
big  house  on  the  south  side;  and  now  they  sat  on  the 
deck  of  the  boat,  being  carried  out  into  darkness,  vowed 
to  motherhood  and  to  fatherhood,  each  more  or  less 
afraid  of  the  other.  They  sat  in  silence,  looking  at  the 
blinking  lights  and  listening  to  the  low  voices  of  their 
fellow  passengers,  also  sitting  in  the  chairs  along  the 
deck  or  strolling  leisurely  about,  and  to  the  wash  of  the 
water  along  the  sides  of  the  boat,  eager  to  break  down 
a  little  reserve  that  the  solemnity  of  the  marriage  service 
had  built  up  between  them. 

A  picture  floated  in  Sam's  mind.  He  saw  Sue,  all  in 
white,  radiant  and  wonderful,  coming  toward  him  down 
a  broad  stairway,  toward  him,  the  newsboy  of  Caxton, 
the  smuggler  of  game,  the  roisterer,  the  greedy  money- 
getter.  All  during  those  six  weeks  he  had  been  waiting 
for  this  hour  when  he  should  sit  beside  the  little  grey- 
clad  figure,  getting  from  her  the  help  he  wanted  in  the 
reconstruction  of  his  life.  Without  being  able  to  talk 
as  he  had  thought  of  talking,  he  yet  felt  assured  and  easy 
in  his  mind.  In  the  moment  when  she  had  come  down 
the  stairway  he  had  been  half  overcome  by  a  feeling  of 
intense  shame,  a  return  of  the  shame  that  had  swept  over 
him  that  night  when  she  had  given  her  word  and  he  had 
walked  hour  after  hour  through  the  streets.  It  had  seemed 

192 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  193 

to  him  that  from  among  the  guests  standing  about  should 
arise  a  voice  crying,  "Stop !  Do  not  go  on !  Let  me  tell 
you  of  this  fellow — this  McPherson !"  And  then  he  had 
seen  her  holding  to  the  arm  of  swaggering,  pretentious 
Colonel  Tom  and  he  had  taken  her  hand  to  become  one 
with  her,  two  curious,  feverish,  strangely  different  human 
beings,  taking  a  vow  in  the  name  of  their  God,  with  the 
flowers  banked  about  them  and  the  eyes  of  people  upon 
them. 

When  Sam  had  gone  to  Colonel  Tom  the  morning 
after  that  evening  in  Jackson  Park,  there  had  been  a 
scene.  The  old  gun  maker  had  blustered  and  roared  and 
forbidden,  pounding  on  his  desk  with  his  fist.  When 
Sam  remained  cool  and  unimpressed,  he  had  stormed 
out  of  the  room  slamming  the  door  and  shouting,  "Up 
start!  Damned  upstart!"  and  Sam  had  gone  smiling 
back  to  his  desk,  mildly  disappointed.  "I  told  Sue  he 
would  say  'Ingrate/  he  thought,  "I  am  losing  my  skill 
at  guessing  just  what  he  will  do  and  say." 

The  Colonel's  rage  had  been  short-lived.  Within  a 
week  he  was  boasting  of  Sam  to  chance  callers  as  "the 
best  business  man  in  America,"  and  in  the  face  of  a 
solemn  promise  given  Sue  was  telling  the  news  of  the 
approaching  marriage  to  every  newspaper  man  he  knew. 
Sam  suspected  him  of  secretly  calling  on  the  telephone 
those  newspapers  whose  representatives  had  not  crossed 
his  trail. 

During  the  six  waiting  weeks  there  had  been  little 
of  love  making  between  Sue  and  Sam.  They  had  talked 
instead,  or,  going  into  the  country  or  to  the  parks,  had 
walked  under  the  trees  consumed  with  a  curious  eager 
passion  of  suspense.  The  idea  she  had  given  him  in 
the  park  grew  in  Sam's  brain.  To  live  for  the  young 
things  that  would  presently  come  to  them,  to  be  simple, 
direct,  and  natural,  like  the  trees  or  the  beasts  of  the 
field,  and  then  to  have  the  native  honesty  of  such  a  life 


194          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

illuminated  and  ennobled  by  a  mutual  intelligent  purpose 
to  make  their  young  something  finer  and  better  than  the 
things  in  Nature  by  the  intelligent  use  of  their  own  good 
minds  and  bodies.  In  the  shops  and  on  the  streets  the 
hurrying  men  and  women  took  on  a  new  significance  to 
him.  He  wondered  what  secret  mighty  purpose  might 
be  in  their  lives,  and  read  a  newspaper  report  of  an 
engagement  or  a  marriage  with  a  little  jump  of  the 
heart.  He  looked  at  the  girls  and  the  women  at  work 
over  the  typewriting  machines  in  the  office,  with  ques 
tioning  eyes,  asking  himself  why  they  did  not  seek  mar 
riage  openly  and  determinedly,  and  saw  a  healthy  single 
woman  as  so  much  wasted  material,  as  a  machine  for 
producing  healthy  new  life  standing  idle  and  unused 
in  the  great  workshop  of  the  universe.  "Marriage  is  a 
port,  a  beginning,  a  point  of  departure,  from  which  men 
and  women  go  forth  upon  the  real  voyage  of  life,"  he 
told  Sue  one  evening  as  they  walked  in  the  park.  "All 
that  goes  before  is  but  a  preparation,  a  building.  The 
pains  and  the  triumphs  of  all  unmarried  people  are  but 
the  good  oak  planks  being  driven  into  place  to  make 
the  vessel  fit  for  the  real  voyage."  Or,  again,  one  night 
when  they  were  in  a  rowboat  on  the  lagoon  in  the  park 
and  all  about  them  in  the  darkness  was  the  plash  of  oars 
in  the  water,  the  screams  of  excited  girls,  and  the  sound 
of  voices  calling,  he  let  the  boat  float  in  against  the 
shores  of  a  little  island  and  crept  along  the  boat  to  kneel, 
with  his  head  in  her  lap  and  whisper,  "It  is  not  the  love 
of  a  woman  that  grips  me,  Sue,  but  the  love  of  life.  I 
have  had  a  peep  into  the  great  mystery.  This — this  is 
why  we  are  here — this  justifies  us." 

Now  that  she  sat  beside  him,  her  shoulder  against  his 
own,  being  carried  away  with  him  into  darkness  and 
privacy,  the  personal  side  of  his  love  for  her  ran  through 
Sam  like  a  flame  and,  turning,  he  drew  her  head  down 
upon  his  shoulder. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  195 

"Not  yet,  Sam/*  she  whispered,  "not  with  these  hun 
dreds  of  people  sleeping  and  drinking  and  thinking  and 
going  about  their  affairs  almost  within  touch  of  our 
hands/' 

They  got  up  and  walked  along  the  swaying  deck.  Out 
of  the  north  the  clean  wind  called  to  them,  the  stars 
looked  down  upon  them,  and  in  the  darkness  in  the  bow 
of  the  boat  they  parted  for  the  night  silently,  speechless 
with  happiness  and  with  a  dear,  unmentioned  secret  be 
tween  them. 

At  dawn  they  landed  at  a  little  lumbering  town,  where 
boat,  blankets,  and  camping  kit  had  gone  before.  A 
river  flowed  down  out  of  the  woods  passing  the  town, 
going  under  a  bridge  and  turning  the  wheel  of  a  saw 
mill  that  stood  by  the  shore  of  the  river  facing  the  lake. 
The  clean  sweet  smell  of  the  new-cut  logs,  the  song  of  the 
saws,  the  roar  of  the  water  tumbling  over  a  dam,  the  cries 
of  the  blue-shirted  lumbermen  working  among  the  float 
ing  logs  above  the  dam,  filled  the  morning  air,  and  above 
the  song  of  the  saws  sang  another  song,  a  breathless, 
waiting  song,  the  song  of  love  and  of  life  singing  in 
the  hearts  of  husband  and  wife. 

In  a  little  roughly-built  lumberman's  hotel  they  ate 
breakfast  in  a  room  overlooking  the  river.  The  pro 
prietor  of  the  hotel,  a  large  red-faced  woman  in  a  clean 
calico  dress,  was  expecting  them  and,  having  served  the 
breakfast,  went  out  of  the  room  grinning  good  naturedly 
and  closing  the  door  behind  her.  Through  the  open  win 
dow  they  looked  at  the  cold  swiftly-flowing  river  and 
at  a  freckled- faced  boy  who  carried  packages  wrapped  in 
blankets  and  put  them  in  a  long  canoe  tied  to  a  little 
wharf  beside  the  hotel.  They  ate  and  sat  staring  at  each 
other  like  two  strange  boys,  saying  nothing.  Sam  ate 
little.  His  heart  pounded  in  his  breast. 

On  the  river  he  sank  his  paddle  deep  into  the  water, 
pulling  against  the  current.  During  the  six  weeks'  wait- 


196          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

ing  in  Chicago  she  had  taught  him  the  essentials  of  the 
canoist's  art  and,  now,  as  he  shot  the  canoe  under  the 
bridge  and  around  a  bend  of  the  river  out  of  sight  of 
the  town,  a  superhuman  strength  seemed  in  his  arms  and 
back.  Before  him  in  the  prow  of  the  boat  sat  Sue,  her 
straight  muscular  little  back  bending  and  straightening 
again.  By  his  side  rose  towering  hills  clothed  with  pine 
trees,  and  piles  of  cut  logs  lay  at  the  foot  of  the  hills 
along  the  shore. 

At  sunset  they  landed  in  a  little  cleared  space  at  the 
foot  of  a  hill  and  on  the  top  of  the  hill,  with  the  wind 
blowing  across  it,  they  made  their  first  camp.  Sam 
brought  boughs  and  spread  them,  lapped  like  feathers  in 
the  wings  of  a  bird,  and  carried  blankets  up  the  hill,  while 
Sue,  at  the  foot,  near  the  overturned  boat,  built  a  fire 
and  prepared  their  first  cooked  meal  out  of  doors.  In 
the  failing  light,  Sue  got  out  her  rifle  and  gave  Sam  his 
first  lesson  in  marksmanship,  his  awkwardness  making 
the  lesson  half  a  jest.  And  then,  in  the  soft  stillness  of 
the  young  night,  with  the  first  stars  coming  into  the  sky 
and  the  clean  cold  wind  blowing  into  their  faces,  they 
went  arm  in  arm  up  the  hill  under  the  trees  to  where  the 
tops  of  the  trees  rolled  and  pitched  like  the  stormy 
waters  of  a  great  sea  before  their  eyes,  and  lay  down 
together  for  their  first  long  tender  embrace. 

There  is  a  special  kind  of  fine  pleasure  in  getting  one's 
first  knowledge  of  the  great  out-of-doors  in  the  company 
of  a  woman  a  man  loves  and  to  have  that  woman  an  ex 
pert,  with  a  keen  appetite  for  the  life,  adds  point  and  fla 
vour  to  the  experience.  In  his  busy  striving,  nickel-seek 
ing  boyhood  in  the  town  surrounded  by  hot  cornfields, 
and  in  his  young  manhood  of  scheming  and  money  hun 
ger  in  the  city,  Sam  had  not  thought  of  vacations  and 
resting  places.  He  had  walked  on  country  roads  with 
John  Telfer  and  Mary  Underwood,  listening  to  their 
talk,  absorbing  their  ideas,  blind  and  deaf  to  the  little 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  197 

life  in  the  grass,  in  the  leafy  branches  of  the  trees  and 
in  the  air  about  him.  In  clubs,  and  about  hotels  and 
barrooms  in  the  city,  he  had  heard  men  talk  of  life  in 
the  open,  and  had  said  to  himself,  "When  my  time  comes 
I  will  taste  these  things." 

And  now  he  did  taste  them,  lying  on  his  back  on  the 
grass  along  the  river,  floating  down  quiet  little  side 
streams  in  the  moonlight,  listening  to  the  night  call  of 
birds,  or  watching  the  flight  of  frightened  wild  things 
as  he  pushed  the  canoe  into  the  quiet  depths  of  the  great 
forest  about  them. 

At  night,  under  the  little  tent  they  had  brought,  or 
beneath  the  blankets  under  the  stars,  he  slept  lightly, 
awakening  often  to  look  at  Sue  lying  beside  him.  Perhaps 
the  wind  had  blown  a  wisp  of  hair  across  her  face  and 
her  breath  played  with  it,  tossing  it  about;  perhaps  just 
the  quiet  of  her  expressive  little  face  charmed  and  held 
him,  so  that  he  turned  reluctantly  to  sleep  again  thinking 
that  he  might,  with  pleasure,  go  on  looking  at  her  all 
night. 

For  Sue  the  days  also  passed  lightly.  She  also  awoke 
in  the  night  and  lay  looking  at  the  man  sleeping  beside 
her,  and  once  she  told  Sam  that  when  he  awoke  she 
feigned  sleep  dreading  to  rob  him  of  the  pleasure  that 
she  knew  these  secret  love  passages  gave  to  both. 

They  were  not  alone  in  those  northern  woods.  Every 
where  along  the  rivers  and  on  the  shores  of  little  lakes 
they  found  people,  to  Sam  a  new  kind  of  people,  who 
dropped  all  the  ordinary  things  of  life,  and  ran  away  to 
the  woods  and  the  streams  to  spend  long  happy  months 
in  the  open.  He  discovered  with  surprise  that  these  ad 
venturers  were  men  of  modest  fortunes,  small  manufac 
turers,  skilled  workingmen,  retail  merchants.  One  with 
whom  he  talked  was  a  grocer  from  a  town  in  Ohio,  and 
when  Sam  asked  him  if  the  coming  to  the  woods  with 
his  family  for  an  eight-weeks  stay  did  not  endanger  the 


198          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

success  of  his  business  he  agreed  with  Sam  that  it  did, 
nodding  his  head  and  laughing. 

"But  there  would  be  a  lot  more  danger  in  not  leaving 
it,"  he  said,  "the  danger  of  having  my  boys  grow 
up  to  be  men  without  my  having  any  real  fun  with 
them." 

Among  all  of  the  people  they  met  Sue  passed  with  a 
sort  of  happy  freedom  that  confounded  Sam,  as  he  had 
formed  a  habit  of  thinking  of  her  always  as  one  shut 
within  herself.  Many  of  the  people  they  saw  she  knew, 
and  he  came  to  believe  that  she  had  chosen  the  place 
for  their  love  making  because  she  admired  and  held  in 
high  favour  the  lives  of  these  people  of  the  out-of-doors 
and  wanted  her  lover  to  be  in  some  way  like  them.  Out 
of  the  solitude  of  the  woods,  along  the  shores  of  little 
lakes,  they  called  to  her  as  she  passed,  demanding  that 
she  come  ashore  and  show  her  husband,  and  among  them 
she  sat  talking  of  other  seasons  and  of  the  inroads  of  the 
lumber  men  upon  their  paradise.  "The  Burnhams  were 
this  year  on  the  shores  of  Grant  Lake,  the  two  school 
teachers  from  Pittsburgh  would  come  early  in  August, 
the  Detroit  man  with  the  crippled  son  was  building  a 
cabin  on  the  shores  of  Bone  River." 

Sam  sat  among  them  in  silence,  renewing  constantly  his 
admiration  for  the  wonder  of  Sue's  past  life.  She,  the 
daughter  of  Colonel  Tom,  the  woman  rich  in  her  own 
right,  to  have  made  her  friends  among  these  people; 
she,  who  had  been  pronounced  an  enigma  by  the 
young  men  of  Chicago,  to  have  been  secretly  all  of 
these  years  the  companion  and  fellow  spirit  of  these 
campers  by  the  lakes. 

For  six  weeks  they  led  a  wandering,  nomadic  life  in 
that  half  wild  land,  for  Sue  six  weeks  of  tender  love 
making,  and  of  the  expression  of  every  thought  and  im 
pulse  of  her  fine  nature,  for  Sam  six  weeks  of  read 
justment  and  freedom,  during  which  he  learned  to  sail 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  199 

a  boat,  to  shoot,  and  to  get  the  fine  taste  of  that  life  into 
his  being. 

And  then  one  morning  they  came  again  to  the  little 
lumber  town  at  the  mouth  of  the  river  and  sat  upon 
the  pier  waiting  for  the  Chicago  boat.  They  were  bound 
once  more  into  the  world,  and  to  that  life  together  that 
was  the  foundation  of  their  marriage  and  that  was  to  be 
the  end  and  aim  of  their  two  lives. 

If  Sam's  life  from  boyhood  had  been,  on  the  whole, 
barren  and  empty  of  many  of  the  sweeter  things,  his  life 
during  the  next  year  was  strikingly  full  and  complete. 
In  the  office  he  had  ceased  being  the  pushing  upstart 
tramping  on  the  toes  of  tradition  and  had  become  the 
son  of  Colonel  Tom,  the  voter  of  Sue's  big  stock  holdings, 
the  practical,  directing  head  and  genius  of  the  destinies 
of  the  company.  Jack  Prince's  loyalty  had  been  re 
warded,  and  a  huge  advertising  campaign  made  the  name 
and  merits  of  the  Rainey  Arms  Company's  wares  known 
to  all  reading  Americans.  The  muzzles  of  Rainey- Whit- 
taker  rifles,  revolvers,  and  shotguns  looked  threateningly 
out  at  one  from  the  pages  of  the  great  popular  magazines, 
brown  fir-clad  hunters  did  brave  deeds  before  one's  eyes, 
kneeling  upon  snow-topped  crags  preparing  to  speed 
winged  death  to  waiting  mountain  sheep;  huge  open- 
mouthed  bears  rushed  down  from  among  the  type  at 
the  top  of  the  pages  and  seemed  about  to  devour  cool 
deliberate  sportsmen  who  stood  undaunted,  swinging 
their  trusty  Rainey-Whittakers  into  place,  and  presi 
dents,  explorers,  and  Texas  gun  fighters  loudly  pro 
claimed  the  merits  of  Rainey-Whittakers  to  a  gun-buy 
ing  world.  It  was  for  Sam  and  for  Colonel  Tom  a  time 
of  big  dividends,  mechanical  progress,  and  content 
ment. 

Sam  stayed  diligently  at  work  in  the  offices  and  in  the 
shops,  but  kept  within  himself  a  reserve  of  strength  and 
resolution  that  might  have  gone  into  the  work.  With 


200         WINDX  McPHERSON'S  SON 

Sue  he  took  up  golf  and  morning  rides  on  horseback,  and 
with  Sue  he  sat  during  the  long  evenings,  reading  aloud, 
absorbing  her  ideas  and  her  beliefs.  Sometimes  for  days 
they  were  like  two  children,  going  off  together  to  walk 
on  country  roads  and  to  sleep  in  country  hotels.  On  these 
walks  they  went  hand  in  hand  or,  bantering  each  other, 
raced  down  long  hills  to  lie  panting  in  the  grass  by  the 
roadside  when  they  were  out  of  breath. 

Near  the  end  of  the  first  year  she  told  him  one  night 
of  the  realisation  of  their  hopes  and  they  sat  through 
the  evening  alone  by  the  fire  in  her  room,  filled  with  the 
white  wonder  of  it,  renewing  to  each  other  all  the  fine 
vows  of  their  early  lovemaking  days. 

Sam  never  succeeded  in  recapturing  the  flavour  of  those 
days.  Happiness  is  a  thing  so  vague,  so  indefinite,  so  de 
pendent  on  a  thousand  little  turns  of  the  events  of  the 
day,  that  it  only  visits  the  most  fortunate  and  at  rare  in 
tervals,  but  Sam  thought  that  he  and  Sue  touched  almost 
ideal  happiness  constantly  during  that  time.  There  were 
weeks  and  even  months  of  their  first  year  together  that 
later  passed  out  of  Sam's  memory  entirely,  leaving  only 
a  sense  of  completeness  and  well  being.  He  could  re 
member,  perhaps,  a  winter  walk  in  the  moonlight  by  the 
frozen  lake,  or  a  visitor  who  sat  and  talked  an  evening 
away  by  their  fire.  But  at  the  end  he  had  to  come  back 
to  this:  that  something  sang  in  his  heart  all  day  long 
and  that  the  air  tasted  better,  the  stars  shone  more 
brightly,  and  the  wind  and  the  rain  and  the  hail  upon  the 
window  panes  sang  more  sweetly  in  his  ears.  He  and  the 
woman  who  lived  with  him  had  wealth,  position,  and 
infinite  delight  in  the  presence  and  the  persons  of  each 
other,  and  a  great  idea  burned  like  a  lamp  in  a  window  at 
the  end  of  the  road  they  travelled. 

Meanwhile,  in  the  world  about  him  events  came  and 
went.  A  president  was  elected,  the  grey  wolves  were  be 
ing  hunted  out  of  the  Chicago  city  council,  and  a  strong 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          201 

rival  to  his  company  flourished  in  his  own  city.  In  other 
days  he  would  have  been  down  upon  this  rival  fighting, 
planning,  working  for  its  destruction.  Now  he  sat  at 
Sue's  feet,  dreaming  and  talking  to  her  of  the  brood  that 
under  their  care  should  grow  into  wonderful  reliant  men 
and  women.  When  Lewis,  the  talented  sales  manager  of 
the  Edwards  Arms  Company,  got  the  business  of  a  Kan 
sas  City  jobber,  he  smiled,  wrote  a  sharp  letter  to  his 
man  in  that  territory,  and  went  for  an  afternoon  of  golf 
with  Sue.  He  had  completely  and  wholly  accepted  Sue's 
conception  of  life.  "We  have  wealth  for  any  emer 
gency,"  he  said  to  himself,  "and  we  will  live  our  lives  for 
service  to  mankind  through  the  children  that  will  pres 
ently  come  into  our  house." 

After  their  marriage  Sam  found  that  Sue,  for  all  her 
apparent  coldness  and  indifference,  had  in  Chicago,  as 
in  the  northern  woods,  her  own  little  circle  of  men  and 
women.  Some  of  these  people  Sam  had  met  during  the 
engagement,  and  now  they  began  gradually  coming  to 
the  house  for  an  evening  with  the  McPhersons.  Some 
times  there  would  be  several  of  them  for  a  quiet  dinner 
at  which  there  was  much  good  talk,  and  after  which  Sue 
and  Sam  sat  for  half  the  night,  continuing  some  vein 
of  thought  brought  to  them.  Among  the  people  who 
came  to  them,  Sam  shone  resplendent.  In  some  indefin 
able  way  he  thought  they  paid  court  to  him  and  the 
thought  flattered  him  immensely.  The  college  professor 
who  had  talked  brilliantly  through  an  evening  turned  to 
Sam  for  approval  of  his  conclusions,  a  writer  of  tales 
of  cowboy  life  asked  him  to  help  him  over  a  difficulty  in 
the  stock  market,  and  a  tall  black-haired  painter  paid  him 
the  rare  compliment  of  repeating  one  of  Sam's  remarks 
as  his  own.  It  was  as  though,  in  spite  of  their  talk,  they 
thought  him  the  most  gifted  of  them  all,  and  for  a  time 
he  was  puzzled  by  their  attitude.  Jack  Prince  came,  sat 
at  one  of  the  dinner  parties,  and  explained. 


202          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

"You  have  got  what  they  want  and  cannot  get — the 
money/'  he  said. 

After  the  evening  when  Sue  told  him  the  great  news 
they  gave  a  dinner.  It  was  a  sort  of  welcoming  party 
for  the  coming  guest,  and,  while  the  people  at  the  table 
ate  and  talked,  Sue  and  Sam,  from  opposite  ends  of 
the  table,  lifted  high  their  glasses  and,  looking  into 
each  other's  eyes,  drank  off  the  health  of  him  who  was 
to  come,  the  first  of  the  great  family,  the  family  that  was 
to  have  two  lives  lived  for  its  success. 

At  the  table  sat  Colonel  Tom  with  his  broad  white 
shift  front,  his  white,  pointed  beard,  and  his  grandilo 
quent  flow  of  talk ;  at  Sue's  side  sat  Jack  Prince,  pausing 
in  his  open  admiration  of  Sue  to  cast  an  eye  on  the  hand 
some  New  York  girl  at  Sam's  end  of  the  table  or  to  punc 
ture,  with  a  flash  of  his  terse  common  sense,  some  balloon 
of  theory  launched  by  Williams  of  the  University,  who 
sat  on  the  other  side  of  Sue;  the  artist,  who  hoped  for 
a  commission  to  paint  Colonel  Tom,  sat  opposite  him 
bewailing  the  dying  out  of  fine  old  American  families; 
and  a  serious-faced  little  German  scientist  sat  beside  Col 
onel  Tom  smiling  as  the  artist  talked.  The  man,  Sam 
fancied,  was  laughing  at  them  both,  perhaps  at  all  of 
them.  He  did  not  mind.  He  looked  at  the  scientist  and 
at  the  other  faces  up  and  down  the  table  and  then  at 
Sue.  He  saw  her  directing  and  leading  the  talk;  he 
saw  the  play  of  muscles  about  her  strong  neck  and  the 
fine  firmness  of  her  straight  little  body,  and  his  eyes 
grew  moist  and  a  lump  came  into  his  throat  at  the  thought 
of  the  secret  that  lay  between  them. 

And  then  his  mind  ran  back  to  another  night  in  Cax- 
ton  when  first  he  sat  eating  among  strange  people  at 
Freedom  Smith's  table.  He  saw  again  the  tomboy  girl 
and  the  sturdy  boy  and  the  lantern  swinging  in  Free 
dom's  hand  in  the  close  little  stable;  he  saw  the  absurd 
housepainter  trying  to  blow  the  bugle  in  the  street;  and 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          203 

the  mother  talking  to  her  boy  of  death  through  the  sum 
mer  evening;  the  fat  foreman  making  the  record  of  his 
loves  on  the  walls  of  his  room,  the  narrow-faced  commis 
sion  man  rubbing  his  hands  before  a  group  of  Greek 
hucksters,  and  then  this — this  home  with  its  safety  and 
its  secret  high  aim  and  him  sitting  there  at  the  head  of 
it  all.  Like  the  novelist,  it  seemed  to  him  that  he  should 
admire  and  bow  his  head  before  the  romance  of  des 
tiny.  He  thought  his  station,  his  wife,  his  country,  his 
end  in  life,  when  rightly  seen,  the  very  apex  of  life  on 
the  earth,  and  to  him  in  his  pride  it  seemed  that  he  was 
in  some  way  the  master  and  the  maker  of  it  all. 


CHAPTER   VII 

LATE  one  evening,  some  weeks  after  the  McPhersons 
had  given  the  dinner  party  in  secret  celebration  of  the 
future  arrival  of  what  was  to  be  the  first  of  the  great 
family,  they  came  together  down  the  steps  of  a  north 
side  house  to  their  waiting  carriage.  They  had  spent, 
Sam  thought,  a  delightful  evening.  The  G  rovers  were 
people  of  whose  friendship  he  was  particularly  proud 
and  since  his  marriage  with  Sue  he  had  taken  her  often 
for  an  evening  to  the  house  of  the  venerable  surgeon. 
Doctor  Grover  was  a  scholar,  a  man  of  note  in  the  medi 
cal  world  and  a  rapid  and  absorbing  talker  and  thinker 
on  any  subject  that  aroused  his  interest.  A  certain  youth 
ful  enthusiasm  in  his  outlook  on  life  had  attracted  to 
him  the  devotion  of  Sue,  who,  since  meeting  him  through 
Sam,  had  counted  him  a  marked  addition  to  their  little 
group  of  friends.  His  wife,  a  white-haired,  plump  little 
woman,  was,  though  apparently  somewhat  diffident,  in 
reality  his  intellectual  equal  and  companion  and  Sue  in 
a  quiet  way  had  taken  her  as  a  model  in  her  own  effort 
toward  complete  wifehood. 

During  the  evening,  spent  in  a  rapid  exchange  of 
opinions  and  ideas  between  the  two  men,  Sue  had  sat  in 
silence.  Once  when  he  looked  at  her  Sam  thought  that 
he  had  surprised  an  annoyed  look  in  her  eyes  and  was 
puzzled  by  it.  During  the  remainder  of  the  evening  her 
eyes  refused  to  meet  his  and  she  looked  instead  at  the 
floor,  a  flush  mounting  her  cheeks. 

At  the  door  of  the  carriage  Frank,  Sue's  coachman, 
stepped  on  the  hem  of  her  gown  and  tore  it.  The  tear 

204 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          205 

was  slight,  the  incident  Sam  thought  entirely  unavoidable, 
and  as  much  due  to  a  momentary  clumsiness  on  the  part 
of  Sue  as  to  the  awkwardness  of  Frank.  The  man  had 
for  years  been  a  loyal  servant  and  a  devoted  admirer  of 
Sue's. 

Sam  laughed  and  taking  Sue  by  the  arm  started  to 
help  her  in  at  the  carriage  door. 

"Too  much  gown  for  an  athlete,"  he  said,  pointlessly. 

In  a  flash  Sue  turned  and  faced  the  coachman. 

"Awkward  brute/'  she  said,  through  her  teeth. 

Sam  stood  on  the  sidewalk  dumb  with  astonishment  as 
Frank  turned  and  climbed  to  his  seat  without  waiting  to 
close  the  carriage  door.  He  felt  as  he  might  have  felt 
had  he,  as  a  boy,  heard  profanity  from  the  lips  of  his 
mother.  The  look  in  Sue's  eyes  as  she  turned  them 
on  Frank  struck  him  like  a  blow  and  in  a  moment  his 
whole  carefully  built-up  conception  of  her  and  of  her 
character  had  been  shaken.  He  had  an  impulse  to  slam 
the  carriage  door  after  her  and  walk  home. 

They  drove  home  in  silence,  Sam  feeling  as  though  he 
rode  beside  a  new  and  strange  being.  In  the  light  of 
passing  street  lamps  he  could  see  her  face  held  straight 
ahead  and  her  eyes  staring  stonily  at  the  curtain  in  front. 
He  didn't  want  to  reproach  her;  he  wanted  to  take  hold 
of  her  arm  and  shake  her.  "I  should  like  to  take  the 
whip  from  in  front  of  Frank's  seat  and  give  her  a  sound 
beating,"  he  told  himself. 

At  the  house  Sue  jumped  out  of  the  carriage  and, 
running  past  him  in  at  the  door,  closed  it  after  her. 
Frank  drove  off  toward  the  stables  and  when  Sam  went 
into  the  house  he  found  Sue  standing  half  way  up  the 
stairs  leading  to  her  room  and  waiting  for  him. 

"I  presume  you  do  not  know  that  you  have  been  openly 
insulting  me  all  evening,"  she  cried.  "Your  beastly  talk 
there  at  the  Grovers — it  was  unbearable — who  are  these 
women?  Why  parade  your  past  life  before  me?" 


206          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

Sam  said  nothing.  He  stood  at  the  foot  of  the  stairs 
and  looked  up  at  her  and  then,  turning,  just  as  she,  run 
ning  up  the  stairs,  slammed  the  door  of  her  own  room, 
he  went  into  the  library.  A  wood  fire  burned  in  the 
grate  and  he  sat  down  and  lighted  his  pipe.  He  did  not 
try  to  think  the  thing  out.  He  felt  that  he  was  in 
the  presence  of  a  lie  and  that  the  Sue  who  had  lived 
in  his  mind  and  in  his  affections  no  longer  existed, 
that  in  her  place  there  was  this  other  woman,  this 
woman  who  had  insulted  her  own  servant  and  had  per 
verted  and  distorted  the  meaning  of  his  talk  during  the 
evening. 

Sitting  by  the  fire  filling  and  refilling  his  pipe,  Sam  went 
carefully  over  every  word,  gesture  and  incident  of  the 
evening  at  the  Grovers  and  could  get  hold  of  no  part  of 
it  that  he  thought  might  in  fairness  serve  as  an  excuse  for 
the  outburst.  In  the  upper  part  of  the  house  he  could 
hear  Sue  moving  restlessly  about  and  he  had  satisfac 
tion  in  the  thought  that  her  mind  was  punishing  her 
for  so  strange  a  seizure.  He  and  Grover  had  perhaps 
been  somewhat  carried  away,  he  told  himself;  they  had 
talked  of  marriage  and  its  meaning  and  had  both  declared 
somewhat  hotly  against  the  idea  that  the  loss  of  virginity 
in  women  was  in  any  sense  a  bar  to  honourable  marriage, 
but  he  had  said  nothing  that  he  thought  could  have  been 
twisted  into  an  insult  to  Sue  or  to  Mrs.  Grover.  He  had 
thought  the  talk  rather  good  and  clearly  thought  out  and 
had  come  out  of  the  house  exhilarated  and  secretly  preen 
ing  himself  with  the  thought  that  he  had  talked  unusually 
forcefully  and  well.  In  any  event  what  had  been  said 
had  been  said  before  in  Sue's  presence  and  he  thought 
that  he  could  remember  her  having,  in  the  past,  expressed 
similar  ideas  with  enthusiasm. 

Hour  after  hour  he  sat  in  the  chair  before  the  dying 
fire.  He  dozed  and  his  pipe  dropped  from  his  hand  and 
fell  upon  the  stone  hearth.  A  kind  of  dumb  misery  and 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  207 

anger  was  in  him  as  over  and  over  endlessly  his  mind 
kept  reviewing  the  events  of  the  evening. 

"What  has  made  her  think  she  can  do  that  to  me?" 
he  kept  asking  himself. 

He  remembered  certain  strange  silences  and  hard  looks 
from  her  eyes  during  the  past  weeks,  silences  and  looks 
that  in  the  light  of  the  events  of  the  evening  became  preg 
nant  with  meaning. 

"She  has  a  temper,  a  beast  of  a  temper.  Why 
shouldn't  she  have  been  square  and  told  me?"  he  asked 
himself. 

The  clock  had  struck  three  when  the  library  door 
opened  quietly  and  Sue,  clad  in  a  dressing  gown  through 
which  the  new  roundness  of  her  lithe  little  figure  was 
plainly  apparent,  came  into  the  room.  She  ran  across 
to  him  and  putting  her  head  down  on  his  knee  wept 
bitterly. 

"Oh,  Sam!"  she  said,  "I  think  I  am  going  insane.  I 
have  been  hating  you  as  I  have  not  hated  since  I  was  an 
evil-tempered  child.  A  thing  I  worked  years  to  suppress 
in  me  has  come  back.  I  have  been  hating  myself  and  the 
baby.  For  days  I  have  been  fighting  the  feeling  in  me, 
and  now  it  has  come  out  and  perhaps  you  have  begun 
hating  me.  Can  you  love  me  again  ?  Will  you  ever  for 
get  the  meanness  and  the  cheapness  of  it?  You  and  poor 
innocent  Frank — Oh,  Sam,  the  devil  was  in  me !" 

Reaching  down,  Sam  took  her  into  his  arms  and  cud 
dled  her  like  a  child.  A  story  he  had  heard  of  the  vaga 
ries  of  women  at  such  times  came  back  to  him  and 
was  as  a  light  illuminating  the  darkness  of  his  mind. 

"I  understand  now,"  he  said.  "It  is  a  part  of  the  bur 
den  you  carry  for  us  both." 

For  some  weeks  after  the  outbreak  at  the  carriage 
door  events  ran  smoothly  in  the  McPherson  house.  One 
day  as  he  stood  in  the  stable  door  Frank  came  round  the 
corner  of  the  house  and,  looking  up  sheepishly  from  un- 


208          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

der  his  cap,  said  to  Sam :  "I  understand  about  the  missus. 
It  is  the  baby  coming.  We  have  had  four  of  them  at  our 
house,"  and  Sam,  nodding  his  head,  turned  and  began 
talking  rapidly  of  his  plans  to  replace  the  carriages  with 
automobiles. 

But  in  the  house,  in  spite  of  the  clearing  up  of  the 
matter  of  Sue's  ugliness  at  the  Grovers,  a  subtle  change 
had  taken  place  in  the  relationship  of  the  two.  Although 
they  were  together  facing  the  first  of  the  events  that  were 
to  be  like  ports-of-call  in  the  great  voyage  of  their  lives, 
they  were  not  facing  it  with  the  same  mutual  understand 
ing  and  kindly  tolerance  with  which  they  had  faced 
smaller  things  in  the  past — a  disagreement  over  the 
method  of  shooting  a  rapid  in  a  river  or  the  entertain 
ment  of  an  undesirable  guest.  The  inclination  to  fits  of 
temper  loosens  and  disarranges  all  the  little  wires  of  life. 
The  tune  will  not  get  itself  played.  One  stands  waiting 
for  the  discord,  strained,  missing  the  harmony.  It  was 
so  with  Sam.  He  began  feeling  that  he  must  keep  a 
check  upon  his  tongue  and  that  things  of  which  they 
had  talked  with  great  freedom  six  months  earlier  now 
annoyed  and  irritated  his  wife  when  brought  into  an 
after-dinner  discussion.  To  Sam,  who,  during  his  life 
with  Sue,  had  learned  the  joy  of  free,  open  talk  upon  any 
subject  that  came  into  his  mind  and  whose  native  interest 
in  life  and  in  the  motives  of  men  and  women  had  blos 
somed  in  the  large  leisure  and  independence  of  the  last 
year,  this  was  trying.  It  was,  he  thought,  like  trying  to 
hold  free  and  open  communion  with  the  people  of  an 
orthodox  family,  and  he  fell  into  a  habit  of  prolonged  si 
lences,  a  habit  that  later,  he  found,  once  formed,  unbe 
lievably  hard  to  break. 

One  day  in  the  office  a  situation  arose  that  seemed  to 
demand  Sam's  presence  in  Boston  on  a  certain  date. 
For  months  he  had  been  carrying  on  a  trade  war  with 
some  of  the  eastern  manufacturers  in  his  line  and  an 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          209 

opportunity  for  the  settlement  of  the  trouble  in  a  way 
advantageous  to  himself  had,  he  thought,  arisen.  He 
wanted  to  handle  the  matter  himself  and  went  home  to 
explain  to  Sue.  It  was  at  the  end  of  a  day  when  nothing 
had  occurred  to  irritate  her  and  she  agreed  with  him 
that  he  should  not  be  compelled  to  trust  so  important  a 
matter  to  another. 

"I  am  no  child,  Sam.  I  will  take  care  of  myself,"  she 
said,  laughing. 

Sam  wired  his  New  York  man  asking  him  to  make 
the  arrangements  for  the  meeting  in  Boston  and  picked 
up  a  book  to  spend  the  evening  reading  aloud  to  her. 

And  then,  coming  home  the  next  evening  he  found  her 
in  tears  and  when  he  tried  to  laugh  away  her  fears 
she  flew  into  a  black  fit  of  anger  and  ran  out  of  the 
room. 

Sam  went  to  the  'phone  and  called  his  New  York  man, 
thinking  to  instruct  him  in  regard  to  the  conference  in 
Boston  and  to  give  up  his  own  plans  for  the  trip.  When 
he  had  got  his  man  on  the  wire,  Sue,  who  had  been 
standing  outside  the  door,  rushed  in  and  put  her  hand 
over  the  mouthpiece  of  the  'phone. 

"Sam!  Sam!"  she  cried.  "Do  not  give  up  the  trip! 
Scold  me !  Beat  me !  Do  anything,  but  do  not  let  me  go 
on  making  a  fool  of  myself  and  destroying  your  peace 
of  mind!  I  shall  be  miserable  if  you  stay  at  home  be 
cause  of  what  I  have  said!" 

Over  the  'phone  came  the  insistent  voice  of  Central 
and  putting  her  hand  aside  Sam  talked  to  his  man,  let 
ting  the  engagement  stand  and  making  some  detail  of  the 
conference  answer  as  his  need  of  calling. 

Again  Sue  was  repentant  and  again  after  her  tears  they 
sat  before  the  fire  until  his  train  time,  talking  like  lovers. 

To  Buffalo  in  the  morning  came  a  wire  from  her. 

"Come  back.  Let  business  go.  Cannot  stand  it,"  she 
had  wired. 


210          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

While  he  sat  reading  the  wire  the  porter  brought  an 
other. 

"Please,  Sam,  pay  no  attention  to  any  wire  from  me. 
I  am  all  right  and  only  half  a  fool." 

Sam  was  irritated.  "It  is  deliberate  pettiness  and 
weakness,"  he  thought,  when  an  hour  later  the  porter 
brought  another  wire  demanding  his  immediate  return. 
'The  situation  calls  for  drastic  action  and  perhaps  one 
good  stinging  reproof  will  stop  it  for  all  time." 

Going  into  the  buffet  car  he  wrote  a  long  letter  call 
ing  her  attention  to  the  fact  that  a  certain  amount  of 
freedom  of  action  was  due  him,  and  saying  that  he  in 
tended  to  act  upon  his  own  judgment  in  the  future  and 
not  upon  her  impulses. 

Having  begun  to  write  Sam  went  on  and  on.  He  was 
not  interrupted,  no  shadow  crossed  the  face  of  his  be 
loved  to  tell  him  he  was  hurting  and  he  said  all  that  was 
in  his  mind  to  say.  Little  sharp  reproofs  that  had  come 
into  his  mind  but  that  had  been  left  unsaid  now  got  them 
selves  said  and  when  he  had  dumped  his  overloaded  mind 
into  the  letter  he  sealed  and  mailed  it  at  a  passing  sta 
tion. 

Within  an  hour  after  the  letter  had  left  his  hands  Sam 
regretted  it.  He  thought  of  the  little  woman  bearing  the 
burden  for  them  both,  and  things  Grover  had  told  him 
of  the  unhappiness  of  women  in  her  condition  came  back 
to  haunt  his  mind  so  that  he  wrote  and  sent  off  to  her 
a  wire  asking  her  not  to  read  the  letter  he  had  mailed 
and  assuring  her  that  he  would  hurry  through  the  Bos 
ton  conference  and  get  back  to  her  at  once. 

When  Sam  returned  he  knew  that  in  an  evil  moment 
Sue  had  opened  and  read  the  letter  sent  from  the  train 
and  was  surprised  and  hurt  by  the  knowledge.  The  act 
seemed  like  a  betrayal.  He  said  nothing,  going  about 
his  work  with  a  troubled  mind  and  watching  with  grow 
ing  anxiety  her  alternate  fits  of  white  anger  and  fearful 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  211 

remorse.  He  thought  her  growing  worse  daily  and  be 
came  alarmed  for  her  health. 

And,  then,  after  a  talk  with  Grover  he  began  to  spend 
more  and  more  time  with  her,  forcing  her  to  take  with 
him  daily,  long  walks  in  the  open  air.  He  tried  valiantly 
to  keep  her  mind  fixed  on  cheerful  things  and  went  to 
bed  happy  and  relieved  when  a  day  ended  that  did  not 
bring  a  stormy  passage  between  them. 

There  were  days  during  that  period  when  Sam  thought 
himself  near  insanity.  With  a  light  in  her  grey  eyes 
that  was  maddening  Sue  would  take  up  some  minor  thing, 
a  remark  he  had  made  or  a  passage  he  had  quoted  from 
some  book,  and  in  a  dead,  level,  complaining  tone  would 
talk  of  it  until  his  head  reeled  and  his  fingers  ached  from 
the  gripping  of  his  hands  to  keep  control  of  himself. 
After  such  a  day  he  would  steal  off  by  himself  and,  walk 
ing  rapidly,  would  try  through  pure  physical  fatigue  to 
force  his  mind  to  give  up  the  remembrance  of  the  per 
sistent  complaining  voice.  At  times  he  would  give  way 
to  fits  of  anger  and  strew  impotent  oaths  along  the  silent 
street,  or,  in  another  mood,  would  mumble  and  talk  to 
himself,  praying  for  strength  and  courage  to  keep  his 
own  head  during  the  ordeal  through  which  he  thought 
they  were  passing  together.  And  when  he  returned  from 
such  a  walk  and  from  such  a  struggle  with  himself  it 
often  occurred  that  he  would  find  her  waiting  in  the  arm 
chair  before  the  fire  in  her  room,  her  mind  clear  and 
her  little  face  wet  with  the  tears  of  her  repentance. 

And  then  the  struggle  ended.  With  Doctor  Grover  it 
had  been  arranged  that  Sue  should  be  taken  to  the  hos 
pital  for  the  great  event,  and  they  drove  there  hurriedly 
one  night  through  the  quiet  streets,  the  recurring  pains 
gripping  Sue  and  her  hands  clutching  his.  An  exalted 
cheerfulness  had  hold  of  them.  Face  to  face  with  the 
actual  struggle  for  the  new  life  Sue  was  transfigured. 
Her  voice  rang  with  triumph  and  her  eyes  glistened. 


212          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

"I  am  going  to  do  it,"  she  cried;  "my  black  fear  is 
gone.  I  shall  give  you  a  child — a  man  child.  I  shall 
succeed,  my  man  Sam.  You  shall  see.  It  will  be  beauti 
ful." 

When  the  pain  gripped  she  gripped  at  his  hand,  and  a 
spasm  of  physical  sympathy  ran  through  him.  He  felt 
helpless  and  ashamed  of  his  helplessness. 

At  the  entrance  to  the  hospital  grounds  she  put  her 
face  down  upon  his  knees  so  that  the  hot  tears  ran 
through  his  hands. 

"Poor,  poor  old  Sam,  it  has  been  horrible  for 
you." 

At  the  hospital  Sam  walked  up  and  down  in  the  corri 
dor  through  the  swinging  doors  at  the  end  of  which  she 
had  been  taken.  Every  vestige  of  regret  for  the  trying 
months  now  lying  behind  had  passed,  and  he  paced  up 
and  down  the  corridor  feeling  that  he  had  come  to 
one  of  those  huge  moments  when  a  man's  brain,  his  grasp 
of  affairs,  his  hopes  and  plans  for  the  future,  all  of  the 
little  details  and  trivialities  of  his  life,  halt,  and  he  waits 
anxious,  breathless,  expectant.  He  looked  at  a  little  clock 
on  a  table  at  the  end  of  the  corridor,  half  expecting  it 
to  stop  also  and  wait  with  him.  His  marriage  hour 
that  had  seemed  so  big  and  vital  seemed  now,  in  the 
quiet  corridor,  with  the  stone  floor  and  the  silent  white- 
clad,  rubber-shod  nurses  passing  up  and  down  and  in 
the  presence  of  this  greater  event,  to  have  shrunk  enor 
mously.  He  walked  up  and  down  peering  at  the  clock, 
looking  at  the  swinging  door  and  biting  at  the  stem  of 
his  empty  pipe. 

And  then  through  the  swinging  door  came  Grover. 

"We  can  get  the  child,  Sam,  but  to  get  it  we  shall  have 
to  take  a  chance  with  her.  Do  you  want  to  do  that? 
Do  not  wait.  Decide." 

Sam  sprang  past  him  toward  the  door. 

"You  bungler,"  he  cried,  and  his  voice  rang  through 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  213 

the  long  quiet  corridor.  "You  do  not  know  what  this 
means.  Let  me  go." 

Doctor  Grover,  catching  him  by  the  arm,  swung  him 
about.  The  two  men  stood  facing  each  other. 

"You  stay  here,"  said  the  doctor,  his  voice  remaining 
quiet  and  firm ;  "I  will  attend  to  things.  Your  going  in 
there  would  be  pure  folly  now.  Now  answer  me— do 
you  want  to  take  the  chance?" 

"No!  No!"  Sam  shouted.  "No!  I  want  her— Sue- 
alive  and  well,  back  through  that  door." 

A  cold  gleam  came  into  his  eyes  and  he  shook  his  fist 
before  the  doctor's  face. 

"Do  not  try  deceiving  me  about  this.  By  God,  I 
will " 

Turning,  Doctor  Grover  ran  back  through  the  swing 
ing  door  leaving  Sam  staring  blankly  at  his  back.  A 
nurse,  one  whom  he  had  seen  in  Doctor  Grover's  office, 
came  out  of  the  door  and  taking  his  arm,  walked  beside 
him  up  and  down  the  corridor.  Sam  put  his  arm  around 
her  shoulder  and  talked.  An  illusion  that  it  was  neces 
sary  to  comfort  her  came  to  him. 

"Do  not  worry,"  he  said.  "She  will  be  all  right. 
Grover  will  take  care  of  her.  Nothing  can  happen  to 
little  Sue." 

The  nurse,  a  small,  sweet-faced,  Scotch  woman,  who 
knew  and  admired  Sue,  wept.  Some  quality  in  his  voice 
had  touched  the  woman  in  her  and  the  tears  ran  in  a 
little  stream  down  her  cheeks.  Sam  continued  talking, 
the  woman's  tears  helping  him  to  regain  his  grip  upon 
himself. 

"My  mother  is  dead,"  he  said,  an  old  sorrow  revisiting 
him.  "I  wish  that  you,  like  Mary  Underwood,  would  be 
a  new  mother  to  me." 

When  the  time  came  that  he  could  be  taken  to  the  room 
where  Sue  lay,  his  self-possession  had  returned  to  him 
and  his  mind  had  begun  blaming  the  little  dead  stranger 


214          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

for  the  unhappiness  of  the  past  months  and  for  the  long 
separation  from  what  he  thought  was  the  real  Sue.  Out 
side  the  door  of  the  room  into  which  she  had  been  taken 
he  stopped,  hearing  her  voice,  thin  and  weak,  talking  to 
Grover. 

"Unfit — Sue  McPherson  unfit,"  said  the  voice,  and 
Sam  thought  it  was  filled  with  an  infinite  weariness. 

He  ran  through  the  door  and  dropped  on  his 
knees  by  her  bed.  She  turned  her  eyes  to  him  smiling 
bravely. 

"The  next  time  we'll  make  it,"  she  said. 

The  second  child  born  to  the  young  McPhersons  ar 
rived  out  of  time.  Again  Sam  walked,  this  time  through 
the  corridor  of  his  own  house  and  without  the  consoling 
presence  of  the  sweet- faced  Scotch  woman,  and  again 
he  shook  his  head  at  Doctor  Grover  who  came  to  him 
consoling  and  reassuring. 

After  the  death  of  the  second  child  Sue  lay  for  months 
in  bed.  In  his  arms,  in  her  own  room,  she  wept  openly 
in  the  presence  of  Grover  and  the  nurses,  crying  out 
against  her  unfitness.  For  several  days  she  refused  to 
see  Colonel  Tom,  harbouring  in  her  mind  the  notion 
that  he  was  in  some  way  responsible  for  her  physical 
inability  to  bear  living  children,  and  when  she  got  up 
from  her  bed,  she  remained  for  months  white  and  list 
less  but  grimly  determined  upon  another  attempt  for  the 
little  life  she  so  wanted  to  feel  in  her  arms. 

During  the  days  of  her  carrying  the  second  baby  she 
had  again  the  fierce  ugly  attacks  of  temper  that  had 
shattered  Sam's  nerves,  but  having  learned  to  under 
stand,  he  went  quietly  about  his  work,  trying  as  far  as 
in  him  lay  to  close  his  ears  to  the  stinging  hurtful  things 
she  sometimes  said;  and  the  third  time,  it  was  agreed 
between  them  that  if  they  were  again  unsuccessful  they 
would  turn  their  minds  to  other  things. 

"If  we  do  not  succeed  this  time  we  might  as  well  count 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  215 

ourselves  through  with  each  other  for  good,"  she  said 
one  day  in  one  of  the  fits  of  cold  anger  that  were  a  part 
of  child  bearing  with  her. 

That  second  night  when  Sam  walked  in  the  hospital 
corridor  he  was  beside  himself.  He  felt  like  a  young 
recruit  called  to  face  an  unseen  enemy  and  to  stand  mo 
tionless  and  inactive  in  the  presence  of  the  singing  death 
that  ran  through  the  air.  He  remembered  a  story,  told 
when  he  was  a  child  by  a  fellow  soldier  who  had  come 
to  visit  his  father,  of  the  prisoners  at  Andersonville 
creeping  in  the  darkness  past  armed  sentries  to  a  little 
pool  of  stagnant  water  beyond  the  dead  line,  and  felt 
that  he  too  was  creeping  unarmed  and  helpless  in  the 
neighbourhood  of  death.  In  a  conference  at  his  house 
between  the  three  some  weeks  before,  it  had  been  de 
cided,  after  tearful  insistence  on  the  part  of  Sue  and  a 
stand  on  the  part  of  Grover,  who  declared  that  he  would 
not  remain  on  the  case  unless  permitted  to  use  his  own 
judgment,  that  an  operation  should  be  performed. 

"Take  the  chances  that  need  be  taken,"  Sam  had  said 
to  Grover  after  the  conference ;  "she  will  never  stand  an 
other  defeat.  Give  her  the  child." 

In  the  corridor  it  seemed  to  Sam  that  hours  had  passed 
and  still  he  stood  motionless  waiting.  His  feet  felt  cold 
and  he  had  the  impression  that  they  were  wet  although 
the  night  was  dry  and  a  moon  shone  outside.  When, 
from  a  distant  part  of  the  hospital,  a  groan  reached  his 
ears  he  shook  with  fright  and  had  an  inclination  to  cry 
out.  Two  young  internes  clad  in  white  passed. 

"Old  Grover  is  doing  a  Caesarian  section,"  said  one 
of  them;  "he  is  getting  out  of  date.  Hope  he  doesn't 
bungle  it." 

In  Sam's  ears  rang  the  remembrance  of  Sue's  voice, 
the  Sue  who  that  first  time  had  gone  into  the  room  be 
hind  the  swinging  doors  with  the  determined  smile  on 
her  face.  He  thought  he  could  see  again  the  white  face 


216          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

looking  up  from  the  wheeled  cot  on  which  they  had 
taken  her  through  the  door. 

"I  am  afraid,  Dr.  Grover — I  am  afraid  I  am  unfit/' 
he  had  heard  her  say  as  the  door  closed. 

And  then  Sam  did  a  thing  for  which  he  cursed  him 
self  the  rest  of  his  life.  On  an  impulse,  and  maddened 
by  the  intolerable  waiting,  he  walked  to  the  swinging 
doors  and,  pushing  them  open,  stepped  into  the  operat 
ing  room  where  Grover  was  at  work  upon  Sue. 

The  room  was  long  and  narrow,  with  floors,  walls  and 
ceiling  of  white  cement.  A  great  glaring  light,  sus 
pended  from  the  ceiling,  threw  its  rays  directly  down  on 
a  white-clad  figure  lying  on  a  white  metal  operating 
table.  On  the  walls  of  the  room  were  other  glaring 
lights  set  in  shining  glass  reflectors.  And,  here  and  there 
through  an  intense  expectant  atmosphere,  moved  and 
stood  silently  a  group  of  men  and  women,  faceless,  hair 
less,  with  only  their  strangely  vivid  eyes  showing  through 
the  white  masks  that  covered  their  faces. 

Sam,  standing  motionless  by  the  door,  looked  about 
with  wild,  half-seeing  eyes.  Grover  worked  rapidly  and 
silently,  taking  from  time  to  time  little  shining  instru 
ments  from  a  swinging  table  close  at  his  hand.  The 
nurse  standing  beside  him  looked  up  toward  the  light 
and  began  calmly  threading  a  needle.  And  in  a  white 
basin  on  a  little  stand  at  the  side  of  the  room  lay  the 
last  of  Sue's  tremendous  efforts  toward  new  life,  the  last 
of  their  dreams  of  the  great  family. 

Sam  closed  his  eyes  and  fell.  His  head,  striking 
against  the  wall,  aroused  him  and  he  struggled  to  his 
feet. 

Without  stopping  his  work,  Grover  began  swearing. 

"Damn  it,  man,  get  out  of  here." 

Sam  groped  with  his  hand  for  the  door.  One  of  the 
white-clad,  ghoulish  figures  started  toward  him.  And 
then  with  his  head  reeling  and  his  eyes  closed  he  backed 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

through  the  door  and,  running  along  the  corridor  and 
down  a  flight  of  broad  stairs,  reached  the  open  air  and 
darkness.  He  had  no  doubt  of  Sue's  death. 

"She  is  gone,"  he  muttered,  hurrying  bareheaded  along 
the  deserted  streets. 

Through  street  after  street  he  ran.  Twice  he  came 
out  upon  the  shores  of  the  lake,  and,  then  turning,  went 
back  into  the  heart  of  the  city  through  streets  bathed  in 
the  warm  moonlight.  Once  he  turned  quickly  at  a 
corner  and  stepping  into  a  vacant  lot  stood  behind  a 
high  board  fence  as  a  policeman  strolled  along  the  street. 
Into  his  head  came  the  idea  that  he  had  killed  Sue  and 
that  the  blue-clad  figure  walking  with  heavy  tread  on 
the  stone  pavement  was  seeking  him  to  take  him  back 
to  where  she  lay  white  and  lifeless.  Again  he  stopped, 
before  a  little  frame  drugstore  on  a  corner,  and  sitting 
down  on  the  steps  before  it  cursed  God  openly  and  de 
fiantly  like  an  angry  boy  defying  his  father.  Some  in 
stinct  led  him  to  look  at  the  sky  through  the  tangle  of 
telegraph  wires  overhead. 

"Go  on  and  do  what  you  dare !"  he  cried.  "I  will  not 
follow  you  now.  I  shall  never  try  to  find  you  after  this.'* 

Presently  he  began  laughing  at  himself  for  ^the  in 
stinct  that  had  led  him  to  look  at  the  sky  and  to  shout 
out  his  defiance  and,  getting  up,  wandered  on.  In  his 
wanderings  he  came  to  a  railroad  track  where  a  freight 
train  groaned  and  rattled  over  a  crossing.  When  he 
came  up  to  it  he  jumped  upon  an  empty  coal  car,  fall 
ing  as  he  climbed,  and  cutting  his  face  upon  the  sharp 
pieces  of  coal  that  lay  scattered  about  the  bottom  of  the 
car. 

The  train  ground  along  slowly,  stopping  occasionally, 
the  engine  shrieking  hysterically. 

After  a  time  he  got  out  of  the  car  and  dropped  to  the 
ground.  On  all  sides  of  him  were  marshes,  the  long 
rank  marsh  grasses  rolling  and  tossing  in  the  moon- 


218          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

light.  When  the  train  had  passed  he  followed  it,  walk 
ing  stumblingly  along.  As  he  walked,  following  the 
blinking  lights  at  the  end  of  the  train,  he  thought  of  the 
scene  in  the  hospital  and  of  Sue  lying  dead  for  that — 
that  thing  livid  and  shapeless  on  the  table  under  the 
lights. 

Where  the  solid  ground  ran  up  to  the  tracks  Sam 
sat  down  under  a  tree.  Peace  came  over  him.  "This 
is  the  end  of  things,"  he  thought,  and  was  like  a  tired 
child  comforted  by  its  mother.  He  thought  of  the 
sweet- faced  nurse  who  had  walked  with  him  that  other 
time  in  the  corridor  of  the  hospital  and  who  had 
wept  because  of  his  fears,  and  then  of  the  night  when  he 
had  felt  the  throat  of  his  father  between  his  fingers  in 
the  squalid  little  kitchen.  He  ran  his  hands  along  the 
ground.  "Good  old  ground/'  he  said.  A  sentence  came 
into  his  mind  followed  by  the  figure  of  John  Telfer  strid 
ing,  stick  in  hand,  along  a  dusty  road.  "Here  is  spring 
come  and  time  to  plant  out  flowers  in  the  grass,"  he  said 
aloud.  His  face  felt  swollen  and  sore  from  the  fall  in 
the  freight  car  and  he  lay  down  on  the  ground  under  a 
tree  and  slept. 

When  he  woke  it  was  morning  and  grey  clouds  were 
drifting  across  the  sky.  Within  sight,  down  a  road,  a 
trolley  car  went  past  into  the  city.  Before  him,  in  the 
midst  of  the  marsh,  lay  a  low  lake,  and  a  raised  walk, 
with  boats  tied  to  the  posts  on  which  it  stood,  ran  down 
to  the  water.  He  went  down  the  walk,  bathed  his  bruised 
face  in  the  water,  and  boarding  a  car  went  back  into  the 
city. 

In  the  morning  air  a  new  thought  took  possession  of 
him.  The  wind  ran  along  a  dusty  road  beside  the  car 
track,  picking  up  little  handfuls  of  dust  and  playfully 
throwing  them  about.  He  had  a  strained,  eager  feeling 
like  some  one  listening  for  a  faint  call  out  of  the  dis 
tance. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  219 

"To  be  sure,"  he  thought,  "I  know  what  it  is,  it  is  my 
wedding  day.  I  am  to  marry  Sue  Rainey  to-day." 

At  the  house  he  found  Grover  and  Colonel  Tom  stand 
ing  in  the  breakfast  room.  Grover  looked  at  his  swollen, 
distorted  face.  His  voice  trembled. 

"Poor  devil!"  he  said.    "You  have  had  a  night!" 

Sam  laughed  and  slapped  Colonel  Tom  on  the  shoulder. 

"We  will  have  to  begin  getting  ready,"  he  said.  "The 
wedding  is  at  ten.  Sue  will  be  getting  anxious." 

Grover  and  Colonel  Tom  took  him  by  the  arm  and 
began  leading  him  up  the  stairs,  Colonel  Tom  weeping 
like  a  woman. 

"Silly  old  fool,"  thought  Sam. 

When,  two  weeks  later,  he  again  opened  his  eyes  to 
consciousness  Sue  sat  beside  his  bed  in  a  reclining  chair, 
her  little  thin  white  hand  in  his. 

"Get  the  baby!"  he  cried,  believing  anything  possible. 
"I  want  to  see  the  baby !" 

She  laid  her  head  down  on  the  pillow. 

"It  was  gone  when  you  saw  it,"  she  said,  and  put  an 
arm  about  his  neck. 

When  the  nurse  came  back  she  found  them,  their  heads 
together  upon  the  pillow,  crying  weakly  like  two  tired 
children. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

THE  blow  given  the  plan  of  life  so  carefully  thought 
out  and  so  eagerly  accepted  by  the  young  McPhersons 
threw  them  back  upon  themselves.  For  several  years 
they  had  been  living  upon  a  hill  top,  taking  themselves 
very  seriously  and  more  than  a  little  preening  themselves 
with  the  thought  that  they  were  two  very  unusual  and 
thoughtful  people  engaged  upon  a  worthy  and  ennobling 
enterprise.  Sitting  in  their  corner  immersed  in  admira 
tion  of  their  own  purposes  and  in  the  thoughts  of  the 
vigorous,  disciplined,  new  life  they  were  to  give  the 
world  by  the  combined  efficiency  of  their  two  bodies  and 
minds  they  were,  at  a  word  and  a  shake  of  the  head  from 
Doctor  Grover,  compelled  to  remake  the  outline  of  their 
future  together. 

All  about  them  the  rush  of  life  went  on,  vast  changes 
were  impending  in  the  industrial  life  of  the  people,  cities 
were  doubling  and  tripling  their  population,  a  war  was 
being  fought,  and  the  flag  of  their  country  flew  in  the 
ports  of  strange  seas,  while  American  boys  pushed  their 
way  through  the  tangled  jungles  of  strange  lands  carry 
ing  in  their  hands  Rainey-Whittaker  rifles.  And  in  a 
huge  stone  house,  set  in  a  broad  expanse  of  green  lawns 
near  the  shores  of  Lake  Michigan,  Sam  McPherson  sat 
looking  at  his  wife,  who  in  turn  looked  at  him.  He  was 
trying,  as  she  also  was  trying,  to  adjust  himself  to  the 
cheerful  acceptance  of  their  new  prospect  of  a  childless 
life. 

Looking  at  Sue  across  the  dinner  table  or  seeing  her 
straight,  wiry  body  astride  a  horse  riding  beside  him 

220 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  221 

through  the  parks,  it  seemed  to  Sam  unbelievable  that 
a  childless  womanhood  was  ever  to  be  her  portion,  and 
more  than  once  he  had  an  inclination  to  venture  agajn 
upon  an  effort  for  the  success  of  their  hopes.  But  when 
he  remembered  her  still  white  face  that  night  in  the  hos 
pital,  her  bitter,  haunting  cry  of  defeat,  he  turned  with 
a  shudder  from  the  thought,  feeling  that  he  could  not 
go  with  her  again  through  that  ordeal ;  that  he  could  not 
again  allow  her  to  look  forward  through  weeks  and 
months  toward  the  little  life  that  never  came  to  lie  upon 
her  breast  or  to  laugh  up  into  her  face. 

And  yet  Sam,  son  of  that  Jane  McPherson  who  had 
won  the  admiration  of  the  men  of  Caxton  by  her  cease 
less  efforts  to  keep  her  family  afloat  and  clean  handed, 
could  not  sit  idly  by,  living  upon  the  income  of  his  own 
and  Sue's  money.  The  stirring,  forward-moving  world 
called  to  him ;  he  looked  about  him  at  the  broad,  signifi 
cant  movements  in  business  and  finance,  at  the  new  men 
coming  into  prominence  and  apparently  finding  a  way 
for  the  expression  of  new  big  ideas,  and  felt  his  youth 
stirring  in  him  and  his  mind  reaching  out  to  new 
projects  and  new  ambitions. 

Given  the  necessity  for  economy  and  a  hard  long- 
drawn-out  struggle  for  a  livelihood  and  competence,  Sam 
could  conceive  of  living  his  life  with  Sue  and  deriving 
something  like  gratification  from  just  her  companionship, 
and  her  partnership  in  his  efforts — here  and  there  during 
the  waiting  years  he  had  met  men  who  had  found  such 
gratification — a  foreman  in  the  shops  or  a  tobacconist 
from  whom  he  bought  his  cigars — but  for  himself  he  felt 
that  he  had  gone  with  Sue  too  far  upon  another  road 
to  turn  that  way  now  with  anything  like  mutual  zeal 
or  interest.  At  bottom,  his  mind  did  not  run  strongly 
toward  the  idea  of  the  love  of  women  as  an  end  in  life; 
he  had  loved,  and  did  love,  Sue  with  something  approach 
ing  religious  fervour,  but  the  fervour  was  more  than 


222          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

half  due  to  the  ideas  she  had  given  him  and  to  the  fact 
that  with  him  she  was  to  have  been  the  instrument  for 
the  realisation  of  those  ideas.  He  was  a  man  with 
children  in  his  loins  and  he  had  given  up  his  struggles 
for  business  eminence  for  the  sake  of  preparing  himself 
for  a  kind  of  noble  fatherhood  of  children,  many  chil 
dren,  strong  children,  fit  gifts  to  the  world  for  two  ex 
ceptionally  favoured  lives.  In  all  of  his  talks  with  Sue 
this  idea  had  been  present  and  dominant.  He  had  looked 
about  him  and  in  the  arrogance  of  his  youth  and  in  the 
pride  of  his  good  body  and  mind  had  condemned  all 
childless  marriages  as  a  selfish  waste  of  good  lives.  With 
her  he  had  agreed  that  such  lives  were  without  point 
and  purpose.  Now  he  remembered  that  in  the  days  of 
her  audacity  and  daring  she  had  more  than  once  ex 
pressed  the  hope  that  in  case  of  a  childless  issue  to  their 
marriage  one  or  the  other  of  them  would  have  the  cour 
age  to  cut  the  knot  that  tied  them  and  venture  into  an 
other  effort  at  right  living  at  any  cost. 

In  the  months  after  Sue's  last  recovery,  and  during  the 
long  evenings,  as  they  sat  together  or  walked  under  the 
stars  in  the  park,  the  thought  of  these  talks  was  often 
in  Sam's  mind  and  he  found  himself  beginning  to  specu 
late  on  her  present  attitude  and  to  wonder  how  bravely 
she  would  meet  the  idea  of  a  separation.  In  the  end  he 
decided  that  no  such  thought  was  in  her  mind,  that  face 
to  face  with  the  tremendous  actuality  she  clung  to  him 
with  a  new  dependence,  and  a  new  need  of  his  com 
panionship.  The  conviction  of  the  absolute  necessity  of 
children  as  a  justification  for  a  man  and  woman  living 
together  had,  he  thought,  burned  itself  more  deeply  into 
his  brain  than  into  hers;  to  him  it  clung,  coming  back 
again  and  again  to  his  mind,  causing  him  to  turn  here 
and  there  restlessly,  making  readjustments,  seeking  new 
light.  The  old  gods  being  dead  he  sought  new  gods. 

In  the  meantime  he  sat  in  his  house  facing  his  wife, 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  223 

losing  himself  in  the  books  recommended  to  him  years 
before  by  Janet,  thinking  his  own  thoughts.  Often  in 
the  evening  he  would  look  up  from  his  book  or  from  his 
preoccupied  staring  at  the  fire  to  find  her  eyes  looking 
at  him. 

"Talk,  Sam;  talk,"  she  would  say;  "do  not  sit  there 
thinking/' 

Or  at  another  time  she  would  come  to  his  room  at 
night  and  putting  her  head  down  on  the  pillow  beside 
his  would  spend  hours  planning,  weeping,  begging  him 
to  give  her  again  his  love,  his  old  fervent,  devoted 
love. 

This  Sam  tried  earnestly  and  honestly  to  do,  going  with 
her  for  long  walks  when  the  new  call,  the  business  had 
begun  to  make  to  him,  would  have  kept  him  at  his  desk, 
reading  aloud  to  her  in  the  evening,  urging  her  to  shake 
off  her  old  dreams  and  to  busy  herself  with  new  work  and 
new  interests. 

Through  the  days  in  the  office  he  went  in  a  kind  of 
half  stupor.  An  old  feeling  of  his  boyhood  coming 
back  to  him,  it  seemed  to  him,  as  it  had  seemed  when  he 
walked  aimlessly  through  the  streets  of  Caxton  after  the 
death  of  his  mother,  that  there  remained  something  to 
be  done,  an  accounting  to  be  made.  Even  at  his  desk 
with  the  clatter  of  typewriters  in  his  ears  and  the  piles 
of  letters  demanding  his  attention,  his  mind  slipped  back 
to  the  days  of  his  courtship  with  Sue  and  to  those  days 
in  the  north  woods  when  life  had  beat  strong  within 
him,  and  every  young,  wild  thing,  every  new  growth 
renewed  the  dream  that  filled  his  being.  Sometimes 
on  the  street,  or  walking  in  the  park  with  Sue,  the 
cries  of  children  at  play  cut  across  the  sombre  dulness 
of  his  mind  and  he  shrank  from  the  sound  and  a  kind  of 
bitter  resentment  took  possession  of  him.  When  he 
looked  covertly  at  Sue  she  talked  of  other  things,  ap 
parently  unconscious  of  his  thoughts. 


224         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

Then  a  new  phase  of  life  presented  itself.  To  his 
surprise  he  found  himself  looking  with  more  than  pass 
ing  interest  at  women  in  the  streets,  and  an  old  hunger 
for  the  companionship  of  strange  women  came  back  to 
him,  in  some  way  coarsened  and  materialised.  One  eve 
ning  at  the  theatre  a  woman,  a  friend  of  Sue's  and  the 
childless  wife  of  a  business  friend  of  his  own,  sat  be 
side  him.  In  the  darkness  of  the  playhouse  her  shoulder 
nestled  down  against  his.  In  the  excitement  of  a  crisis 
on  the  stage  her  hand  slipped  into  his  and  her  fingers 
clutched  and  held  his  fingers. 

Animal  desire  seized  and  shook  him,  a  feeling  without 
sweetness,  brutal,  making  his  eyes  burn.  When  between 
the  acts  the  theatre  was  again  flooded  with  light  he  looked 
up  guiltily  to  meet  another  pair  of  eyes  equally  filled  with 
guilty  hunger.  A  challenge  had  been  given  and  re 
ceived. 

In  their  car,  homeward  bound,  Sam  put  the  thoughts  of 
the  woman  away  from  him  and  taking  Sue  in  his  arms 
prayed  silently  for  some  help  against  he  knew  not  what. 

"I  think  I  will  go  to  Caxton  in  the  morning  and  have 
a  talk  with  Mary  Underwood,"  he  said. 

After  his  return  from  Caxton  Sam  set  about  finding 
some  new  interest  to  occupy  Sue's  mind.  He  had  spent 
an  afternoon  talking  to  Valmore,  Freedom  Smith,  and 
Telfer  and  thought  there  was  a  kind  of  flatness  in  their 
jokes  and  in  their  ageing  comments  on  each  other. 
Then  he  had  gone  from  them  for  his  talk  with  Mary. 
Half  through  the  night  they  had  talked,  Sam  getting  for 
giveness  for  not  writing  and  getting  also  a  long  friendly 
lecture  on  his  duty  toward  Sue.  He  thought  she  had  in 
some  way  missed  the  point.  She  had  seemed  to  suppose 
that  the  loss  of  the  children  had  fallen  singly  upon  Sue. 
She  had  not  counted  upon  him,  and  he  had  depended 
upon  her  doing  just  that.  He  had  come  as  a  boy  to  Tiis 
mother  wanting  to  talk  of  himself  and  she  had  wept  at 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  225 

the  thought  of  the  childless  wife  and  had  told  him  how 
to  set  about  making  her  happy. 

"Well,  I  will  set  about  it,"  he  thought  on  the  train 
coming  home ;  "I  will  find  for  her  this  new  interest  and 
make  her  less  dependent  upon  me.  Then  I  also  will  take 
hold  anew  and  work  out  for  myself  a  programme  for  a 
way  of  life." 

One  afternoon  when  he  came  home  from  the  office 
he  found  Sue  filled  indeed  with  a  new  idea.  With  glow 
ing  cheeks  she  sat  beside  him  through  the  evening  and 
talked  of  the  beauties  of  a  life  devoted  to  social  service. 

"I  have  been  thinking  things  out,"  she  said,  her  eyes 
shining.  "We  must  not  allow  ourselves  to  become  sor 
did.  We  must  keep  to  the  vision.  We  must  together 
give  the  best  in  our  lives  and  our  fortunes  to  mankind. 
We  must  make  ourselves  units  in  the  great  modern  move 
ments  for  social  uplift."  • 

Sam  looked  at  the  fire  and  a  chill  feeling  of  doubt  ran 
through  him.  He  could  not  see  himself  as  a  unit  in  any 
thing.  His  mind  did  not  run  out  toward  the  thought  of 
being  one  of  the  army  of  philanthropists  or  rich  social 
uplifters  he  had  met  talking  and  explaining  in  the  read 
ing  rooms  of  clubs.  No  answering  flame  burned  in  his 
heart  as  it  had  burned  that  evening  by  the  bridle  path  in 
Jackson  Park  when  she  had  expounded  another  idea. 
But  the  thought  of  a  need  of  new  interest  for  her  com 
ing  to  him,  he  turned  to  her  smiling. 

"It  sounds  all  right  but  I  know  nothing  of  such  things," 
he  said. 

After  that  evening  Sue  began  to  get  a  hold  upon  her 
self.  The  old  fire  came  back  into  her  eyes  and  she  went 
about  the  house  with  a  smile  upon  her  face  and  talked 
through  the  evenings  to  her  silent  attentive  husband  of 
the  life  of  usefulness,  the  full  life.  One  day  she  told 
him  of  her  election  to  the  presidency  of  a  society  for  the 
rescue  of  fallen  women,  and  he  began  seeing  her  name 


226          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

in  the  newspapers  in  connection  with  various  charity  and 
civic  movements.  At  the  house  a  new  sort  of  men  and 
women  began  appearing  at  the  dinner  table ;  a  strangely 
earnest,  feverish,  half  fanatical  people,  Sam  thought,  with 
an  inclination  toward  corsetless  dresses  and  uncut  hair, 
who  talked  far  into  the  night  and  worked  themselves  into 
a  sort  of  religious  zeal  over  what  they  called  their  move 
ment.  Sam  found  them  likely  to  run  to  startling  state 
ments,  noticed  that  they  sat  on  the  edges  of  their  chairs 
when  they  talked,  and  was  puzzled  by  their  tendency 
toward  making  the  most  revolutionary  statements  with 
out  pausing  to  back  them  up.  When  he  questioned  a 
statement  made  by  one  of  these  people,  he  came  down 
upon  him  with  a  rush  that  quite  carried  him  away  and 
then,  turning  to  the  others,  looked  at  them  wisely  like 
a  cat  that  has  swallowed  a  mouse.  "Ask  us  another 
question  if  you  dare,"  their  faces  seemed  to  be  saying, 
while  their  tongues  declared  that  they  were  but  students 
of  the  great  problem  of  right  living. 

With  these  new  people  Sam  never  made  any  progress 
toward  real  understanding  and  friendship.  For  a  time 
he  tried  honestly  to  get  some  of  their  own  fervent  devo 
tions  to  their  ideas  and  to  be  impressed  by  what  they 
said  of  their  love  of  man,  even  going  with  them  to  some 
of  their  meetings,  at  one  of  which  he  sat  among  the  fallen 
women  gathered  in,  and  listened  to  a  speech  by  Sue. 

The  speech  did  not  make  much  of  a  hit,  the  fallen 
women  moving  restlessly  about.  A  large  woman,  with 
an  immense  nose,  did  better.  She  talked  with  a  swift, 
contagious  zeal  that  was  very  stirring,  and,  listening  to 
her,  Sam  was  reminded  of  the  evening  when  he  sat  before 
another  zealous  talker  in  the  church  at  Caxton  and  Jim 
Williams,  the  barber,  tried  to  stampede  him  into  the  fold 
with  the  lambs.  While  the  woman  talked  a  plump  little 
member  of  the  demi  monde  who  sat  beside  Sam  wept 
copiously,  but  at  the  end  of  the  speech  he  could  remem- 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  227 

her  nothing  of  what  had  been  said  and  he  wondered  if 
the  weeping  woman  would  remember. 

To  express  his  determination  to  continue  being  Sue's 
companion  and  partner,  Sam  during  one  winter  taught 
a  class  of  young  men  at  a  settlement  house  in  the  factory 
district  of  the  west  side.  The  class  in  his  hands  was  un 
successful.  He  found  the  young  men  heavy  and  stupid 
with  fatigue  after  the  day  of  labour  in  the  shops  and 
more  inclined  to  fall  asleep  in  their  chairs,  or  wander 
away,  one  at  a  time,  to  loaf  and  smoke  on  a  nearby 
corner,  than  to  stay  in  the  room  listening  to  the  man 
reading  or  talking  before  them. 

When  one  of  the  young  women  workers  came  into 
the  room,  they  sat  up  and  seemed  for  the  moment  in 
terested.  Once  Sam  heard  a  group  of  them  talking  of 
these  women  workers  on  a  landing  in  a  darkened  stair 
way.  The  experience  startled  Sam  and  he  dropped  the 
class,  admitting  to  Sue  his  failure  and  his  lack  of  interest 
and  bowing  his  head  before  her  accusation  of  a  lack  of 
the  love  of  men. 

Later  by  the  fire  in  his  own  room  he  tried  to  draw  for 
himself  a  moral  from  the  experience. 

"Why  should  I  love  these  men?"  he  asked  himself. 
"They  are  what  I  might  have  been.  Few  of  the  men  I 
have  known  have  loved  me  and  some  of  the  best  and 
cleanest  of  them  have  worked  vigorously  for  my  defeat. 
Life  is  a  battle  in  which  few  men  win  and  many  are 
defeated  and  in  which  hate  and  fear  play  their  part 
with  love  and  generosity.  These  heavy-featured  young 
men  are  a  part  of  the  world  as  men  have  made  it.  Why 
this  protest  against  their  fate  when  we  are  all  of  us 
making  more  and  more  of  them  with  every  turn  of 
the  clock?" 

During  the  next  year,  after  the  fiasco  of  the  settle 
ment  house  class,  Sam  found  himself  drifting  more  and 
more  rapidly  away  from  Sue  and  her  new  viewpoint  of 


228          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

life.  The  growing  gulf  between  them  showed  itself  in 
a  thousand  little  household  acts  and  impulses,  and  every 
time  he  looked  at  her  he  thought  her  more  apart  from 
him  and  less  a  part  of  the  real  life  that  went  on  within 
him.  In  the  old  days  there  had  been  something  intimate 
and  familiar  in  her  person  and  in  her  presence.  She 
had  seemed  like  a  part  of  him,  like  the  room  in  which 
he  slept  or  the  coat  he  wore  on  his  back,  and  he  had 
looked  into  her  eyes  as  thoughtlessly  and  with  as  little 
fear  of  what  he  might  find  there  as  he  looked  at  his  own 
hands.  Now  when  his  eyes  met  hers  they  dropped,  and 
one  or  the  other  of  them  began  talking  hurriedly  like 
a  person  who  has  a  consciousness  of  something  he  must 
conceal. 

Down  town  Sam  took  up  anew  his  old  friendship  and 
intimacy  with  Jack  Prince,  going  with  him  to  clubs  and 
drinking  places  and  often  spending  evenings  among  the 
clever,  money-wasting  young  men  who  laughed  and  made 
deals  and  talked  their  way  through  life  at  Jack's  side. 
Among  these  young  men  a  business  associate  of  Jack's 
caught  his  attention  and  in  a  few  weeks  an  intimacy 
had  sprung  up  between  Sam  and  this  man. 

Maurice  Morrison,  Sam's  new  friend,  had  been  dis 
covered  by  Jack  Prince  working  as  a  sub-editor  on  a 
country  daily  down  the  state.  There  was,  Sam  thought, 
something  of  the  Caxton  dandy,  Mike  McCarthy,  in  the 
man,  combined  with  prolonged  and  fervent,  although 
somewhat  periodic  attacks  of  industry.  In  his  youth 
he  had  written  poetry  and  at  one  time  had  studied  for 
the  ministry,  and  in  Chicago,  under  Jack  Prince,  he  had 
developed  into  a  money  maker  and  led  the  life  of  a 
talented,  rather  unscrupulous  man  of  the  world.  He 
kept  a  mistress,  often  overdrank,  and  Sam  thought  him 
the  most  brilliant  and  convincing  talker  he  had  ever 
heard.  As  Jack  Prince's  assistant  he  had  charge  of  the 
Rainey  Company's  large  advertising  expenditure,  and 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  229 

the  two  men  being  thrown  often  together  a  mutual  re 
gard  grew  up  between  them.  Sam  believed  him  to  be 
without  moral  seftse;  he  knew  him  to  be  able  and  honest 
and  he  found  in  the  association  with  him  a  fund  of  odd 
little  sweetnesses  of  character  and  action  that  lent  an 
inexpressible  charm  to  the  person  of  his  friend. 

It  was  through  Morrison  that  Sam  had  his  first  serious 
misunderstanding  with  Sue.  One  evening  the  brilliant 
young  advertising  man  dined  at  the  McPhersons'.  The 
table,  as  usual,  was  filled  with  Sue's  new  friends,  among 
them  a  tall,  gaunt  man  who,  with  the  arrival  of  the 
coffee,  began  in  a  high-pitched,  earnest  voice  to  talk  of 
the  coming  social  revolution.  Sam  looked  across  the 
table  and  saw  a  light  dancing  in  Morrison's  eyes.  Like  a 
hound  unleashed  he  sprang  among  Sue's  friends,  tearing 
the  rich  to  pieces,  calling  for  the  onward  advance  of  the 
masses,  quoting  odds  and  ends  of  Shelley  and  Carlyle, 
peering  earnestly  up  and  down  the  table,  and  at  the  end 
quite  winning  the  hearts  of  the  women  by  a  defence  of 
fallen  women  that  stirred  the  blood  of  even  his  friend 
and  host. 

Sam  was  amused  and  a  trifle  annoyed.  The  whole 
thing  was,  he  knew,  no  more  than  a  piece  of  downright 
acting  with  just  the  touch  of  sincerity  in  it  that  was 
characteristic  of  the  man  but  that  had  no  depth  or  real 
meaning.  During  the  rest  of  the  evening  he  watched 
Sue,  wondering  if  she  too  had  fathomed  Morrison  and 
what  she  thought  of  his  having  taken  the  role  of  star 
from  the  long  gaunt  man,  who  had  evidently  beer*  booked 
for  that  part  and  who  sat  at  the  table  and  wandered  after 
ward  among  the  guests,  annoyed  and  disconcerted. 

Late  that  night  Sue  came  into  his  room  and  found  him 
reading  and  smoking  by  the  fire. 

"Cheeky  of  Morrison,  dimming  your  star/'  he  said, 
looking  at  her  and  laughing  apologetically. 

Sue  looked  at  him  doubtfully. 


230          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

"I  came  in  to  thank  you  for  bringing  him/'  she  said ; 
"I  thought  him  splendid." 

Sam  looked  at  her  and  for  a  moment  was  tempted  to 
let  the  matter  pass.  And  then  his  old  inclination  to  be 
always  open  and  frank  with  her  asserted  itself  and  he 
closed  the  book  and  rising  stood  looking  down  at  her. 

"The  little  beast  was  guying  your  crowd,"  he  said,  "but 
I  do  not  want  him  to  guy  you.  Not  that  he  wouldn't  try. 
He  has  the  audacity  for  anything." 

A  flush  arose  to  her  cheeks  and  her  eyes  gleamed. 

"That  is  not  true,  Sam,"  she  said  coldly.  "You  say 
that  because  you  are  becoming  hard  and  cold  and  cynical. 
Your  friend  Morrison  talked  from  his  heart.  It  was 
beautiful.  Men  like  you,  who  have  a  strong  influence 
over  him,  may  lead  him  away,  but  in  the  end  a  man  like 
that  will  come  to  give  his  life  to  the  service  of  society. 
You  should  help  him ;  not  assume  an  attitude  of  unbelief 
and  laugh  at  him." 

Sam  stood  upon  the  hearth  smoking  his  pipe  and  look 
ing  at  her.  He  was  thinking  how  easy  it  would  have 
been  in  the  first  year  after  their  marriage  to  have  ex 
plained  Morrison.  Now  he  felt  that  he  was  but  making 
a  bad  matter  worse,  but  went  on  determined  to  stick  to 
his  policy  of  being  entirely  honest  with  her. 

"Look  here,  Sue,"  he  began  quietly,  "be  a  good  sport. 
Morrison  was  joking.  I  know  the  man.  He  is  the 
friend  of  men  like  me  because  he  wants  to  be  and  be 
cause  it  pays  him  to  be.  He  is  a  talker,  a  writer,  a 
talented,  unscrupulous  word-monger.  He  is  making  a 
big  salary  by  taking  the  ideas  of  men  like  me  and  ex 
pressing  them  better  than  we  can  ourselves.  He  is  a 
good  workman  and  a  generous,  open-hearted  fellow  with 
a  lot  of  nameless  charm  in  him,  but  a  man  of  convictions 
he  is  not.  He  could  talk  tears  into  the  eyes  of  your  fallen 
women,  but  he  would  be  a  lot  more  likely  to  talk  good 
women  into  their  state." 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          231 

Sam  put  a  hand  upon  her  shoulder. 

"Be  sensible  and  do  not  be  offended,"  he  went  on :  "take 
the  fellow  for  what  he  is  and  be  glad  for  him.  He  hurts 
little  and  cheers  a  lot.  He  could  make  a  convincing  argu 
ment  in  favour  of  civilisation's  return  to  cannibalism,  but 
really,  you  know,  he  spends  most  of  his  time  thinking 
and  writing  of  washing  machines  and  ladies'  hats  and 
liver  pills,  and  most  of  his  eloquence  after  all  only  comes 
down  to  'Send  for  catalogue,  Department  K'  in  the 
end." 

Sue's  voice  was  colourless  with  passion  when  she  re 
plied. 

"This  is  unbearable.  Why  did  you  bring  the  fellow 
here?" 

Sam  sat  down  and  picked  up  his  book.  In  his  im 
patience  he  lied  to  her  for  the  first  time  since  their 
marriage. 

"First,  because  I  like  him  and  second,  because  I  wanted 
to  see  if  I  couldn't  produce  a  man  who  could  outsentimen- 
talise  your  socialist  friends,"  he  said  quietly. 

Sue  turned  and  walked  out  of  the  room.  In  a  way  the 
action  was  final  and  marked  the  end  of  understanding  be 
tween  them.  Putting  down  his  book  Sam  watched  her 
go  and  some  feeling  he  had  kept  for  her  and  that  had 
differentiated  her  from  all  other  women  died  in  him  as 
the  door  closed  between  them.  Throwing  the  book  aside 
he  sprang  to  his  feet  and  stood  looking  at  the  door. 

"The  old  good  fellowship  appeal  is  dead,"  he  thought. 
"From  now  on  we  will  have  to  explain  and  apologise  like 
two  strangers.  No  more  taking  each  other  for  granted." 

Turning  out  the  light  he  sat  again  before  the  fire  to 
think  his  way  through  the  situation  that  faced  him.  He 
had  no  thought  that  she  would  return.  That  last  shot  of 
his  own  had  crushed  the  possibility  of  that. 

The  fire  was  getting  low  in  the  grate  and  he  did  not 
renew  it.  He  looked  past  it  toward  the  darkened  win- 


232          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

dows  and  heard  the  hum  of  motor  cars  along  the  boule 
vard  below.  Again  he  was  the  boy  of  Caxton  hungrily 
seeking  an  end  in  life.  The  flushed  face  of  the  woman  in 
the  theatre  danced  before  his  eyes.  He  remembered  with 
shame  how  he  had,  a  few  days  before,  stood  in  a  doorway 
and  followed  with  his  eyes  the  figure  of  a  woman  who 
had  lifted  her  eyes  to  him  as  they  passed  in  the  street. 
He  wished  that  he  might  go  out  of  the  house  for  a  walk 
with  John  Telfer  and  have  his  mind  filled  with  eloquence 
of  the  standing  corn,  or  sit  at  the  feet  of  Janet  Eberly 
as  she  talked  of  books  and  of  life.  He  got  up  and  turn 
ing  on  the  lights  began  preparing  for  bed. 

"I  know  what  I  will  do,"  he  said,  "I  will  go  to  work. 
I  will  do  some  real  work  and  make  some  more  money. 
That's  the  place  for  me." 

And  to  work  he  went,  real  work,  the  most  sustained 
and  clearly  thought-out  work  he  had  done.  For  two 
years  he  was  out  of  the  house  at  dawn  for  a  long  bracing 
walk  in  the  fresh  morning  air,  to  be  followed  by  eight, 
ten  and  even  fifteen  hours  in  the  office  and  shops;  hours 
in  which  he  drove  the  Rainey  Arms  Company's  organisa 
tion  mercilessly  and,  taking  openly  every  vestige  of  the 
management  out  of  the  hands  of  Colonel  Tom,  began  the 
plans  for  the  consolidation  of  the  American  firearms 
companies  that  later  put  his  name  on  the  front  pages 
of  the  newspapers  and  got  him  the  title  of  a  Captain  of 
Finance. 

There  is  a  widespread  misunderstanding  abroad  re 
garding  the  motives  of  many  of  the  American  million 
aires  who  sprang  into  prominence  and  affluence  in  the 
days  of  change  and  sudden  bewildering  growth  that  fol 
lowed  the  close  of  the  Spanish  War.  They  were,  many 
of  them,  not  of  the  brute  trader  type,  but  were,  instead, 
men  who  thought  and  acted  quickly  and  with  a  daring  and 
audacity  impossible  to  the  average  mind.  They  wanted 
power  and  were,  many  of  them,  entirely  unscrupulous, 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  233 

but  for  the  most  part  they  were  men  with  a  fire  burning 
within  them,  men  who  became  what  they  were  because 
the  world  offered  them  no  better  outlet  for  their  vast 
energies. 

Sam  McPherson  had  been  untiring  and  without 
scruples  in  the  first  hard  quick  struggle  to  get  his  head 
above  the  great  unknown  body  of  men  there  in  the  city. 
He  had  turned  aside  from  money  getting  when  he  heard 
what  he  took  to  be  a  call  to  a  better  way  of  life.  Now 
with  the  fires  of  youth  still  in  him  and  with  the  training 
and  discipline  that  had  come  from  two  years  of  reading, 
of  comparative  leisure  and  of  thought,  he  was  prepared 
to  give  the  Chicago  business  world  a  display  of  that  tre 
mendous  energy  that  was  to  write  his  name  in  the  indus 
trial  history  of  the  city  as  one  of  the  first  of  the  western 
giants  of  finance. 

Going  to  Sue,  Sam  told  her  frankly  of  his  plans. 

"I  want  a  free  hand  in  the  handling  of  your  stock  in 
the  company,"  he  said.  "I  cannot  lead  this  new  life  of 
yours.  It  may  help  and  sustain  you  but  it  gets  no  hold 
on  me.  I  want  to  be  myself  now  and  lead  my  own  life 
in  my  own  way.  I  want  to  run  the  company,  really  run 
it.  I  cannot  stand  idly  by  and  let  life  go  past.  I  am 
hurting  myself  and  you  standing  here  looking  on.  Also 
I  am  in  a  kind  of  danger  of  another  kind  that  I  want  to 
avoid  by  throwing  myself  into  hard,  constructive  work." 

Without  question  Sue  signed  the  papers  he  brought  her. 
A  flash  of  her  old  frankness  toward  him  came  back. 

"I  do  not  blame  you,  Sam,"  she  said,  smiling  bravely. 
"Things  have  not  gone  right,  as  we  both  know,  but  if  we 
cannot  work  together  at  least  let  us  not  hurt  each  other." 

When  Sam  returned  to  give  himself  again  to  affairs, 
the  country  was  just  at  the  beginning  of  the  great  wave  of 
consolidation  which  was  finally  to  sweep  all  of  the  finan 
cial  power  of  the  country  into  a  dozen  pairs  of  competent 
and  entirely  efficient  hands.  With  the  sure  instinct  of 


234          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

the  born  trader  Sam  had  seen  this  movement  coming  and 
had  studied  it.  Now  he  began  to  act.  Going  to  that 
same  swarthy- faced  lawyer  who  had  drawn  the  contract 
for  him  to  secure  control  of  the  medical  student's 
twenty  thousand  dollars  and  who  had  jokingly  invited 
him  to  become  one  of  a  band  of  train  robbers,  he  told 
him  of  his  plans  to  begin  working  toward  a  consolida 
tion  of  all  the  firearms  companies  of  the  country. 

Webster  wasted  no  time  in  joking  now.  He  laid  out 
the  plans,  adjusted  and  readjusted  them  to  suit  Sam's 
shrewd  suggestions  and  when  a  fee  was  mentioned  shook 
his  head. 

"I  want  in  on  this/'  he  said.  "You  will  need  me.  I 
am  made  for  this  game  and  have  been  waiting  for  a 
chance  to  get  at  it.  Just  count  me  in  as  one  of  the  pro 
moters  if  you  will." 

Sam  nodded  his  head.  Within  a  week  he  had  formed 
a  pool  of  his  own  company's  stock  controlling,  as  he 
thought,  a  safe  majority  and  had  begun  working  to  form 
a  similar  pool  in  the  stock  of  his  only  big  western  rival. 

This  last  job  was  not  an  easy  one.  Lewis,  the  Jew,  had 
been  making  constant  headway  in  that  company  just  as 
Sam  had  made  headway  in  the  Rainey  Company.  He 
was  a  money  maker,  a  sales  manager  of  rare  ability,  and, 
as  Sam  knew,  a  planner  and  executor  of  business  coups 
of  the  first  class. 

Sam  did  not  want  to  deal  with  Lewis.  He  had  respect 
for  the  man's  ability  in  driving  sharp  bargains  and  felt 
that  he  would  like  to  have  the  whip  in  his  own  hands 
when  it  came  to  the  point  of  dealing  with  him.  To 
this  end  he  began  visiting  bankers  and  the  men  who  were 
head  of  big  western  trust  companies  in  Chicago  and  St. 
Louis.  He  went  about  his  work  slowly,  feeling  his  way 
and  trying  to  get  at  each  man  by  some  effective  appeal, 
buying  the  use  of  vast  sums  of  money  by  a  promise  of 
common  stock,  the  bait  of  a  big  active  bank  account,  and, 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          235 

here  and  there,  by  the  hint  of  a  directorship  in  the  big 
new  consolidated  company. 

For  a  time  the  project  moved  slowly;  indeed  there 
were  weeks  and  months  when  it  did  not  appear  to  move 
at  all.  Working  in  secret  and  with  extreme  caution  Sam 
encountered  many  discouragements  and  went  home  in 
the  evening  day  after  day  to  sit  among  Sue's  guests  with 
a  mind  filled  with  his  own  plans  and  with  an  indifferent 
ear  turned  to  the  talk  of  revolution,  social  unrest,  and 
the  new  class  consciousness  of  the  masses,  that  rattled 
and  crackled  up  and  down  his  dinner  table.  He  thought 
that  it  must  be  trying  to  Sue.  He  was  so  evidently  not 
interested  in  her  interests.  At  the  same  time  he  thought 
that  he  was  working  toward  what  he  wanted  out  of  life 
and  went  to  bed  at  night  believing  that  he  was  finding, 
and  would  find,  a  kind  of  peace  in  just  thinking  clearly 
along  one  line  day  after  day. 

One  day  Webster,  who  had  wanted  to  be  in  on  the  deal, 
came  to  Sam's  office  and  gave  his  project  its  first  great 
boost  toward  success.  He,  like  Sam,  thought  he  saw 
clearly  the  tendencies  of  the  times,  and  was  greedy  for 
the  block  of  common  stock  that  Sam  had  promised  should 
come  to  him  with  the  completion  of  the  enterprise. 

"You  are  not  using  me,"  he  said,  sitting  down  before 
Sam's  desk.  "What  is  blocking  the  deal?" 

Sam  began  to  explain  and  when  he  had  finished  Web 
ster  laughed. 

"Let's  get  at  Tom  Edwards  of  the  Edward  Arms  Com 
pany  direct,"  he  said,  and  then,  leaning  over  the  desk, 
"Edwards  is  a  vain  little  peacock  and  a  second  rate  busi 
ness  man,"  he  declared  emphatically.  "Get  him  afraid 
and  then  flatter  his  vanity.  He  has  a  new  wife  with 
blonde  hair  and  big  soft  blue  eyes.  He  wants  prominence. 
He  is  afraid  to  venture  upon  big  things  himself  but  is 
hungry  for  the  reputation  and  gain  that  comes  through 
big  deals.  Use  the  method  the  Jew  has  used ;  show  him 


236          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

what  it  means  to  the  yellow-haired  woman  to  be  the  wife 
of  the  president  of  the  big  consolidated  Arms  Company. 
THE  EDWARDS  CONSOLIDATED,  eh?  Get  at  Ed 
wards.  Bluff  him  and  flatter  him  and  he  is  your 


man." 


Sam  wondered.  Edwards  was  a  small  grey-haired 
man  of  sixty  with  something  dry  and  unresponsive  about 
him.  Being  a  silent  man,  he  had  created  an  impression 
of  remarkable  shrewdness  and  ability.  After  a  lifetime 
spent  in  hard  labour  and  in  the  practice  of  the  most  rigid 
economy  he  had  come  up  to  wealth,  and  had  got  into  the 
firearms  business  through  Lewis,  and  it  was  counted 
one  of  the  brightest  stars  in  that  brilliant  Hebrew's  crown 
that  he  had  been  able  to  lead  Edwards  with  him  in 
his  daring  and  audacious  handling  of  the  company's 
affairs. 

Sam  looked  at  Webster  across  the  desk  and  thought  of 
Tom  Edwards  as  the  figurehead  of  the  firearms  trust. 

"I  was  saving  the  frosting  on  the  cake  for  my  own 
Tom,"  he  said;  "it  was  a  thing  I  wanted  to  hand  the 
Colonel." 

"Let  us  see  Edwards  this  evening,"  said  Webster 
dryly. 

Sam  nodded,  and  late  that  night  made  the  deal  that 
gave  him  control  of  the  two  important  western  companies 
and  put  him  in  position  to  move  on  the  eastern  companies 
with  every  prospect  of  complete  success.  To  Edwards 
he  went  with  an  exaggerated  report  of  the  support  he 
had  already  got  for  his  project,  and  having  frightened 
him  offered  him  the  presidency  of  the  new  company  and 
promised  that  it  should  be  incorporated  under  the  name 
of  The  Edwards  Consolidated  Firearms  Company  of 
America. 

The  eastern  companies  fell  quickly.  With  Webster 
Sam  tried  on  them  the  old  dodge  of  telling  each  that  the 
other  two  had  agreed  to  come  in,  and  it  worked. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          237 

With  the  coming  in  of  Edwards  and  the  options  given 
by  the  eastern  companies  Sam  began  to  get  also  the  sup 
port  of  the  LaSalle  Street  bankers.  The  firearms  trust 
was  one  of  the  few  big  consolidations  managed  wholly  in 
the  west,  and  after  two  or  three  of  the  bankers  had  agreed 
to  help  finance  Sam's  plan  the  others  began  asking  to 
be  taken  ihto  the  underwriting  syndicate  he  and  Webster 
had  formed.  Within  thirty  days  after  the  closing  of  the 
deal  with  Tom  Edwards  Sam  felt  that  he  was  ready 
to  act. 

For  several  months  Colonel  Tom  had  known  some 
thing  of  the  plans  Sam  had  on  foot,  and  had  made  no 
protest.  He  had  in  fact  given  Sam  to  understand  that 
his  stock  would  be  voted  with  Sue's,  controlled  by  Sam, 
and  with  the  stock  of  the  other  directors  who  knew  of 
and  hoped  to  share  in  the  profits  of  Sam's  deal.  The  old 
gunmaker  had  all  of  his  life  believed  that  the  other  Amer 
ican  firearms  companies  were  but  shadows  destined  to 
disappear  before  the  rising  sun  of  The  Rainey  Company, 
and  thought  of  Sam's  project  as  an  act  of  providence  to 
further  this  desirable  end. 

At  the  moment  of  his  acquiescence  in  Webster's  plan, 
for  landing  Tom  Edwards,  Sam  had  a  moment  of  doubt, 
and  now,  with  the  success  of  his  project  in  sight,  he 
began  to  wonder  how  the  blustering  old  man  would  look 
upon  Edwards  as  the  titular  head  of  the  big  company 
and  upon  the  name  of  Edwards  in  the  title  of  the  com 
pany. 

For  two  years  Sam  had  seen  little  of  the  Colonel,  who 
had  given  up  all  pretence  to  an  active  part  in  the  manage 
ment  of  the  business  and  who,  finding  Sue's  new  friends 
disconcerting,  seldom  appeared  at  the  house,  living  at 
the  clubs,  playing  billiards  all  day  long,  or  sitting  in  the 
club  windows  boasting  to  chance  listeners  of  his  part  in 
the  building  of  the  Rainey  Arms  Company. 

With  a  mind  filled  with  doubt  Sam  went  home  and 


238          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

put  the  matter  before  Sue.  She  was  dressed  and  ready 
for  an  evening  at  the  theatre  with  a  party  of  friends  and 
the  talk  was  brief. 

"He  will  not  mind,"  she  said  indifferently.  "Go  ahead 
and  do  what  you  want  to  do." 

Sam  rode  back  to  the  office  and  called  his  lieutenants 
about  him.  He  felt  that  the  thing  might  as  well  be  done 
and  over,  and  with  the  options  in  his  hands,  and  the 
ability  he  thought  he  had  to  control  his  own  company, 
he  was  ready  to  come  out  into  the  open  and  get  the 
deal  cleaned  up. 

The  morning  papers  that  carried  the  story  of  the  pro 
posed  big  new  consolidation  of  firearms  companies  car 
ried  also  an  almost  life-size  halftone  of  Colonel  Tom 
Rainey,  a  slightly  smaller  one  of  Tom  Edwards,  and 
grouped  about  these,  small  pictures  of  Sam,  Lewis, 
Prince,  Webster,  and  several  of  the  eastern  men.  By  the 
size  of  the  half-tone,  Sam,  Prince,  and  Morrison  had 
tried  to  reconcile  Colonel  Tom  to  Edwards'  name  in  the 
title  of  the  new  company  and  to  Edwards'  coming  elec 
tion  as  president.  The  story  also  played  up  the  past 
glories  of  the  Rainey  Company  and  its  directing  genius, 
Colonel  Tom.  One  phrase,  written  by  Morrison,  brought 
a  smile  to  Sam's  lips. 

"This  grand  old  patriarch  of  American  business,  re 
tired  now  from  active  service,  is  like  a  tired  giant,  who, 
having  raised  a  brood  of  young  giants,  goes  into  his  castle 
to  rest  and  reflect  and  to  count  the  scars  won  in  many 
a  hard-fought  battle." 

Morrison  laughed  as  he  read  it  aloud. 

"It  ought  to  get  the  Colonel,"  he  said,  "but  the  news 
paper  man  who  prints  it  should  be  hung." 

"They  will  print  it  all  right,"  said  Jack  Prince. 

And  they  did  print  it;  going  from  newspaper  office 
to  newspaper  office  Prince  and  Morrison  saw  to  that, 
using  their  influence  as  big  buyers  of  advertising  space 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  239 

and  even  insisting  upon  reading  proof  on  their  own 
masterpiece. 

But  it  did  not  work.  Early  the  next  morning  Colonel 
Tom  appeared  at  the  offices  of  the  arms  company  with 
blood  in  his  eye,  and  swore  that  the  consolidation  should 
not  be  put  through.  For  an  hour  he  stormed  up  and 
down  in  Sam's  office,  his  outbursts  of  wrath  varied  by 
periods  of  childlike  pleading  for  the  retention  of  the 
name  and  glory  of  the  Raineys.  When  Sam  shook  his 
head  and  went  with  the  old  man  to  the  meeting  that  was 
to  pass  upon  his  action  and  sell  the  Rainey  Company, 
he  knew  that  he  had  a  fight  on  his  hands. 

The  meeting  was  a  stormy  one.  Sam  made  a  talk  tell 
ing  what  had  been  done  and  Webster,  voting  some  of 
Sam's  proxies,  made  a  motion  that  Sam's  offer  for  the 
old  company  be  accepted. 

And  then  Colonel  Tom  fired  his  guns.  Walking  up 
and  down  in  the  room  before  the  men,  sitting  at  a  long 
table  or  in  chairs  tilted  against  the  walls,  he  began  talk 
ing  with  all  of  his  old  flamboyant  pomposity  of  the  past 
glories  of  the  Rainey  Company.  Sam  watched  him 
quietly  thinking  of  the  exhibition  as  something  detached 
and  apart  from  the  business  of  the  meeting.  He  remem 
bered  a  question  that  had  come  into  his  head  when  he 
was  a  schoolboy  and  had  got  his  first  peep  into  a  school 
history.  There  had  been  a  picture  of  Indians  at  the  war 
dance  and  he  had  wondered  why  they  danced  before 
rather  than  after  battle.  Now  his  mind  answered  the 
question. 

"If  they  had  not  danced  before  they  might  never  have 
got  the  chance,"  he  thought,  and  smiled  to  himself. 

"I  call  upon  you  men  here  to  stick  to  the  old  colours," 
roared  the  Colonel,  turning  and  making  a  direct  attack 
upon  Sam.  "Do  not  let  this  ungrateful  upstart,  this  son 
of  a  drunken  village  housepainter,  that  I  picked  up  from 
among  the  cabbages  of  South  Water  Street,  win  you 


240          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

away  from  your  loyalty  to  the  old  leader.  Do  not  let  him 
steal  by  trickery  what  we  have  won  only  by  years  of 
effort." 

The  Colonel,  leaning  on  the  table,  glared  about 
the  room.  Sam  felt  relieved  and  glad  of  the  direct 
attack. 

"It  justifies  what  I  am  going  to  do/*  he  thought. 

When  Colonel  Tom  had  finished  Sam  gave  a  careless 
glance  at  the  old  man's  red  face  and  trembling  fingers. 
He  had  no  doubt  that  the  outburst  of  eloquence  had  fallen 
upon  deaf  ears  and  without  comment  put  Webster's  mo 
tion  to  the  vote. 

To  his  surprise  two  of  the  new  employe  directors 
voted  their  stock  with  Colonel  Tom's,  and  a  third  man, 
voting  his  own  stock  as  well  as  that  of  a  wealthy  south- 
side  real  estate  man,  did  not  vote.  On  a  count  the  stock 
represented  stood  deadlocked  and  Sam,  looking  down  the 
table,  raised  his  eyebrows  to  Webster. 

"Move  we  adjourn  for  twenty-four  hours,"  snapped 
Webster,  and  the  motion  carried. 

Sam  looked  at  a  paper  lying  before  him  on  the  table. 
During  the  count  of  the  vote  he  had  been  writing  over 
and  over  on  the  sheet  of  paper  this  sentence. 

"The  best  men  spend  their  lives  seeking  truth." 

Colonel  Tom  walked  out  of  the  room  like  a  conqueror, 
declining  to  speak  to  Sam  as  he  passed,  and  Sam  looked 
down  the  table  at  Webster  and  made  a  motion  with  his 
head  toward  the  man  who  had  not  voted. 

Within  an  hour  Sam's  fight  was  won.  Pouncing  upon 
the  man  representing  the  stock  of  the  south-side  in 
vestor,  he  and  Webster  did  not  go  out  of  the  room  until 
they  had  secured  absolute  control  of  the  Rainey  Company 
and  the  man  who  had  refused  to  vote  had  put  twenty- 
five  thousand  dollars  into  his  pocket.  The  two  employe 
directors  Sam  marked  for  slaughter.  Then  after  spend 
ing  the  afternoon  and  early  evening  with  the  representa- 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  241 

lives  of  the  eastern  companies  and  their  attorneys  he 
drove  home  to  Sue. 

It  was  past  nine  o'clock  when  his  car  stopped  before 
the  house  and,  going  at  once  to  his  room,  he  found  Sue 
sitting  before  his  fire,  her  arms  thrown  above  her  head 
and  her  eyes  staring  at  the  burning  coals. 

As  Sam  stood  in  the  doorway  looking  at  her  a  wave  of 
resentment  swept  over  him. 

"The  old  coward,"  he  thought,  "he  has  brought  our 
fight  here  to  her." 

Hanging  up  his  coat  he  filled  his  pipe  and  drawing  up 
a  chair  sat  beside  her.  For  five  minutes  Sue  sat  staring 
into  the  fire.  When  she  spoke  there  was  a  touch  of 
hardness  in  her  voice. 

"When  everything  is  said,  Sam,  you  do  owe  a  lot  to 
father,"  she  observed,  refusing  to  look  at  him. 

Sam  said  nothing  and  she  went  on. 

"Not  that  I  think  we  made  you,  father  and  I.  You 
are  not  the  kind  of  man  that  people  make  or  unmake.  But, 
Sam,  Sam,  think  what  you  are  doing.  He  has  always 
been  a  fool  in  your  hands.  He  used  to  come  home  here 
when  you  were  new  with  the  company  and  talk  of  what 
he  was  doing.  He  had  a  whole  new  set  of  ideas  and 
phrases;  all  that  about  waste  and  efficiency  and  orderly 
working  toward  a  definite  end.  It  did  not  fool  me.  I 
knew  the  ideas,  and  even  the  phrases  he  used  to  express 
them,  were  not  his  and  I  was  not  long  finding  out  they 
were  yours,  that  it  was  simply  you  expressing  yourself 
through  him.  He  is  a  big  helpless  child,  Sam,  and  he  is 
old.  He  hasn't  much  longer  to  live.  Do  not  be  hard, 
Sam.  Be  merciful." 

Her  voice  did  not  tremble  but  tears  ran  down  her  rigid 
face  and  her  expressive  hands  clutched  at  her  dress. 

"Can  nothing  change  you?  Must  you  always  have 
your  own  way?"  she  added,  still  refusing  to  look  at 
him. 


242          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

"It  is  not  true,  Sue,  that  I  always  want  my  own  way, 
and  people  do  change  me;  you  have  changed  me,"  he 
said. 

She  shook  her  head. 

"No,  I  have  not  changed  you.  I  found  you  hungry  for 
something  and  you  thought  I  could  feed  it.  I  gave  you 
an  idea  that  you  took  hold  of  and  made  your  own.  I 
do  not  know  where  I  got  it,  from  some  book  or  hearing 
some  one  talk,  I  suppose.  But  it  belonged  to  you.  You 
built  it  and  fostered  it  in  me  and  coloured  it  with  your 
own  personality.  It  is  your  idea  to-day.  It  means  more 
to  you  than  all  this  firearms  trust  that  the  papers  are 
full  of." 

She  turned  to  look  at  him,  and  put  out  her  hand  and 
laid  it  in  his. 

"I  have  not  been  brave,"  she  said.  "I  am  standing  in 
your  way.  I  have  had  a  hope  that  we  would  get  back 
to  each  other.  I  should  have  freed  you  but  I  hadn't  the 
courage,  I  hadn't  the  courage.  I  could  not  give  up  the 
dream  that  some  day  you  would  really  take  me  back 
to  you." 

Getting  out  of  her  chair  she  dropped  to  her  knees  and 
putting  her  head  in  his  lap,  shook  with  sobs.  Sam  sat 
stroking  her  hair.  Her  agitation  was  so  great  that  her 
muscular  little  back  shook  with  it. 

Sam  looked  past  her  at  the  fire  and  tried  to  think 
clearly.  He  was  not  greatly  moved  by  her  agitation,  but 
with  all  his  heart  he  wanted  to  think  things  out  and  get 
at  the  right  and  the  honest  thing  to  do. 

"It  is  a  time  of  big  things,"  he  said  slowly  and  with  an 
air  of  one  explaining  to  a  child.  "As  your  socialists  say, 
vast  changes  are  going  on.  I  do  not  believe  that  your 
socialists  really  sense  what  these  changes  mean,  and  I  am 
not  sure  that  I  do  or  that  any  man  does,  but  I  know  they 
mean  something  big  and  I  want  to  be  in  them  and  a  part 
of  them;  all  big  men  do;  they  are  struggling  like  chicks 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          243 

in  the  shell.  Why  look  here !  What  I  am  doing  has  to 
be  done  and  if  I  do  not  do  it  another  man  will.  The 
Colonel  has  to  go.  He  will  be  swept  aside.  He  belongs 
to  something  old  and  outworn.  Your  socialists,  I  be 
lieve,  call  it  the  age  of  competition." 

"But  not  by  us,  not  by  you,  Sam,"  she  plead.  "After 
all,  he  is  my  father." 

A  stern  look  came  into  Sam's  eyes. 

"It  does  not  ring  right,  Sue,"  he  said  coldly ;  "fathers 
do  not  mean  much  to  me.  I  choked  my  own  father  and 
threw  him  into  the  street  when  I  was  only  a  boy.  You 
knew  about  that.  You  heard  of  it  when  you  went  to  find 
out  about  me  that  time  in  Caxton.  Mary  Underwood 
told  you.  I  did  it  because  he  lied  and  believed  in  lies. 
Do  not  your  friends  say  that  the  individual  who  stands 
in  the  way  should  be  crushed?" 

She  sprang  to  her  feet  and  stood  before  him. 

"Do  not  quote  that  crowd,"  she  burst  out.  "They  are 
not  the  real  thing.  Do  you  suppose  I  do  not  know  that  ? 
Do  I  not  know  that  they  come  here  because  they  hope 
to  get  hold  of  you?  Haven't  I  watched  them  and  seen 
the  look  on  their  faces  when  you  have  not  come  or 
have  not  listened  to  their  talk?  They  are  afraid  of  you, 
all  of  them.  That's  why  they  talk  so  bitterly.  They 
are  afraid  and  ashamed  that  they  are  afraid." 

"Like  the  workers  in  the  shop?"  he  asked,  musingly. 

"Yes,  like  that,  and  like  me  since  I  failed  in  my  part 
of  our  lives  and  had  not  the  courage  to  get  out  of  the 
way.  You  are  worth  all  of  us  and  for  all  our  talk  we 
shall  never  succeed  or  begin  to  succeed  until  we  make 
men  like  you  want  what  we  want.  They  know  that  and  I 
know  it." 

"And  what  do  you  want?" 

"I  want  you  to  be  big  and  generous.  You  can  be. 
Failure  cannot  hurt  you.  You  and  men  like  you  can  do 
anything.  You  can  even  fail.  I  cannot.  None  of  us 


244          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

can.  I  cannot  put  my  father  to  that  shame.  I  want 
you  to  accept  failure." 

Sam  got  up  and  taking  her  by  the  arm  led  her  to  the 
door.  At  the  door  he  turned  her  about  and  kissed  her 
on  the  lips  like  a  lover. 

"All  right,  Sue  girl,  I  will  do  it,"  he  said,  and  pushed 
her  through  the  door.  "Now  let  me  sit  down  by  my 
self  and  think  things  out." 

It  was  a  night  in  September  and  a  whisper  of  the  com 
ing  frost  was  in  the  air.  He  threw  up  the  window  and 
took  long  breaths  of  the  sharp  air  and  listened  to  the 
rumble  of  the  elevated  road  in  the  distance.  Looking 
up  the  boulevard  he  saw  the  lights  of  the  cyclists  making 
a  glistening  stream  that  flowed  past  the  house.  A  thought 
of  his  new  motor  car  and  of  all  of  the  wonder  of  the 
mechanical  progress  of  the  world  ran  through  his  mind. 

"The  men  who  make  machines  do  not  hesitate,"  he 
said  to  himself;  "even  though  a  thousand  fat-hearted  men 
stood  in  their  way  they  would  go  on." 

A  line  of  Tennyson's  came  into  his  mind. 

"And  the  nation's  airy  navies  grappling  in  the  central 
blue,"  he  quoted,  thinking  of  an  article  he  had  read  pre 
dicting  the  coming  of  airships. 

He  thought  of  the  lives  of  the  workers  in  steel  and  iron 
and  of  the  things  they  had  done  and  would  do. 

"They  have,"  he  thought,  "freedom.  Steel  and  iron 
do  not  run  home  to  carry  the  struggle  to  women  sitting 
by  the  fire." 

He  walked  up  and  down  the  room. 

"Fat  old  coward.  Damned  fat  old  coward,"  he  mut 
tered  over  and  over  to  himself. 

It  was  past  midnight  when  he  got  into  bed  and  began 
trying  to  quiet  himself  for  sleep.  In  his  dreams  he  saw 
a  fat  man  with  a  chorus  girl  hanging  to  his  arm  kicking 
his  head  about  a  bridge  above  a  swiftly  flowing  stream. 

When  he  got  down  to  the  breakfast  room  the  next 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  245 

morning  Sue  had  gone.  By  his  plate  he  found  a  note 
saying  that  she  had  gone  for  Colonel  Tom  and  would 
take  him  to  the  country  for  the  day.  He  walked  to  the 
office  thinking  of  the  incapable  old  man  who,  in  the  name 
of  sentiment,  had  beaten  him  in  what  he  thought  the  big 
enterprise  of  his  life. 

At  his  desk  he  found  a  message  from  Webster.  "The 
old  Turkey  cock  has  fled,"  it  said ;  "we  should  have  saved 
the  twenty-five  thousand." 

On  the  phone  Webster  told  Sam  of  an  early  visit  to  the 
club  to  see  Colonel  Tom  and  that  the  old  man  had  left 
the  city,  going  to  the  country  for  the  day.  It  was  on 
Sam's  lips  to  tell  of  his  changed  plans  but  he  hesitated. 

"I  will  see  you  at  your  office  in  an  hour,"  he  said. 

Outside  again  in  the  open  air  Sam  walked  and  thought 
of  his  promise.  Down  by  the  lake  he  went  to  where  the 
railroad  with  the  lake  beyond  stopped  him.  Upon  the  old 
wooden  bridge  looking  over  the  track  and  down  to  the 
water  he  stood  as  he  had  stood  at  other  crises  in  his  life 
and  thought  over  the  struggle  of  the  night  before.  In 
the  clear  morning  air,  with  the  roar  of  the  city  behind 
him  and  the  still  waters  of  the  lake  in  front,  the  tears, 
and  the  talk  with  Sue  seemed  but  a  part  of  the  ridiculous 
and  sentimental  attitude  of  her  father,  and  the  promise 
given  her  insignificant  and  unfairly  won.  He  reviewed 
the  scene  carefully,  the  talk  and  the  tears  and  the  prom 
ise  given  as  he  led  her  to  the  door.  It  all  seemed  far 
away  and  unreal  like  some  promise  made  to  a  girl  in 
his  boyhood. 

"It  was  never  a  part  of  all  this,"  he  said,  turning  and 
looking  at  the  towering  city  before  him. 

For  an  hour  he  stood  on  the  wooden  bridge.  He 
thought  of  Windy  McPherson  putting  the  bugle  to  his 
lips  in  the  streets  of  Caxton  and  again  there  sounded 
in  his  ears  the  roaring  laugh  of  the  crowd ;  again  he  lay 
in  the  bed  beside  Colonel  Tom  in  that  northern  city  and 


246          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

saw  the  moon  rising  over  the  round  paunch  and  heard 
the  empty  chattering  talk  of  love. 

"Love,"  he  said,  still  looking  toward  the  city,  "is  a 
matter  of  truth,  not  lies  and  pretence." 

Suddenly  it  seemed  to  him  that  if  he  went  forward 
truthfully  he  should  get  even  Sue  back  again  some  time. 
His  mind  lingered  over  the  thoughts  of  the  loves  that 
come  to  a  man  in  the  world,  of  Sue  in  the  wind-swept 
northern  woods  and  of  Janet  in  her  wheel-chair  in  the 
little  room  where  the  cable  cars  ran  rumbling  under  the 
window.  And  he  thought  of  other  things,  of  Sue  read 
ing  papers  culled  out  of  books  before  the  fallen  women 
in  the  little  State  Street  hall,  of  Tom  Edwards  with  his 
new  wife  and  his  little  watery  eyes,  of  Morrison  and 
the  long-fingered  socialist  fighting  over  words  at  his  table. 
And  then  pulling  on  his  gloves  he  lighted  a  cigar  and 
went  back  through  the  crowded  streets  to  his  office  to 
do  the  thing  he  had  determined  on. 

At  the  meeting  that  afternoon  the  project  went  through 
without  a  dissenting  voice.  Colonel  Tom  being  absent, 
the  two  employe  directors  voted  with  Sam  with  almost 
panicky  haste  as  Sam  looking  across  at  the  well-dressed 
cool-headed  Webster,  laughed  and  lighted  a  fresh  cigar. 
And  then  he  voted  the  stock  Sue  had  intrusted  to  him 
for  the  project,  feeling  that  in  doing  so  he  was  cutting, 
perhaps  for  all  time,  the  knot  that  bound  them. 

With  the  completion  of  the  deal  Sam  stood  to  win 
five  million  dollars,  more  money  than  Colonel  Tom  or 
any  of  the  Raineys  had  ever  controlled,  and  had  placed 
himself  in  the  eyes  of  the  business  men  of  Chicago  and 
New  York  where  before  he  had  placed  himself  in  the 
eyes  of  Caxton  and  South  Water  Street.  Instead  of 
another  Windy  McPherson  failing  to  blow  his  bugle 
before  the  waiting  crowd,  he  was  still  the  man  who  made 
good,  the  man  who  achieved,  the  kind  of  man  of  whom 
America  boasts  before  the  world. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  247 

He  did  not  see  Sue  again.  When  the  news  of  his  be 
trayal  reached  her  she  went  off  east  taking  Colonel  Tom 
with  her,  and  Sam  closed  the  house,  even  sending  a 
man  there  for  his  clothes.  To  her  eastern  address,  got 
from  her  attorney,  he  wrote  a  brief  note  offering  to 
make  over  to  her  or  to  Colonel  Tom  his  entire  winnings 
from  the  deal  and  closed  it  with  the  brutal  declaration, 
"At  the  end  I  could  not  be  an  ass,  even  for  you/' 

To  this  note  Sam  got  a  cold  brief  reply  telling  him 
to  dispose  of  her  stock  in  the  company  and  of  that  be 
longing  to  Colonel  Tom,  and  naming  an  eastern  trust 
company  to  receive  the  money.  With  Colonel  Tom's  help 
she  had  made  a  careful  estimate  of  the  values  of  their 
holdings  at  the  time  of  consolidation  and  refused  flatly 
to  accept  a  penny  beyond  that  amount. 

Sam  felt  that  another  chapter  of  his  life  was  closed. 
Webster,  Edwards,  Prince  and  the  eastern  men  met  and 
elected  him  chairman  of  the  board  of  directors  of  the 
new  company  and  the  public  bought  eagerly  the  river 
of  common  stock  he  turned  upon  the  market,  Prince  and 
Morrison  doing  masterful  work  in  the  moulding  of  pub 
lic  opinion  through  the  press.  The  first  board  meeting 
ended  with  a  dinner  at  which  wine  flowed  in  rivulets  and 
Edwards,  getting  drunk,  stood  up  at  his  place  and  boasted 
of  the  beauty  of  his  young  wife.  And  Sam,  at  his  desk  in 
his  new  offices  in  the  Rookery,  settled  down  grimly  to 
the  playing  of  his  role  as  one  of  the  new  kings  of  Amer 
ican  business. 


CHAPTER   IX 

THE  story  of  Sam's  life  there  in  Chicago  for  the  next 
several  years  ceases  to  be  the  story  of  a  man  and  becomes 
the  story  of  a  type,  a  crowd,  a  gang.  What  he  and  the 
group  of  men  surrounding  him  and  making  money  with 
him  did  in  Chicago,  other  men  and  other  groups  of  men 
have  done  in  New  York,  in  Paris,  in  London.  Coming 
into  power  with  the  great  expansive  wave  of  prosperity 
that  attended  the  first  McKinley  administration,  these 
men  went  mad  of  money  making.  They  played  with 
great  industrial  institutions  and  railroad  systems  like 
excited  children,  and  a  man  of  Chicago  won  the  notice 
and  something  of  the  admiration  of  the  world  by  his 
willingness  to  bet  a  million  dollars  on  the  turn  of  the 
weather.  In  the  years  of  criticism  and  readjustment 
that  have  followed  this  period  of  sporadic  growth,  writ 
ers  have  told  with  great  clearness  how  the  thing  was 
done,  and  some  of  the  participants,  captains  of  industry 
turned  penmen,  Caesars  become  ink-slingers,  have  bruited 
the  story  to  an  admiring  world. 

Given  the  time,  the  inclination,  the  power  of  the  press, 
and  the  unscrupulousness,  the  thing  that  Sam  McPher- 
son  and  his  followers  did  in  Chicago  is  not  difficult.  Ad 
vised  by  Webster,  and  with  the  talented  Prince  and  Mor 
rison  to  handle  his  publicity  work,  he  rapidly  unloaded 
his  huge  holdings  of  common  stock  upon  an  eager  public, 
keeping  for  himself  the  bonds  which  he  hypothecated  at 
the  banks  to  increase  his  working  capital  while  continuing 
to  control  the  company.  When  the  common  stock  was 
unloaded,  he,  with  a  group  of  fellow  spirits,  began  an 

248 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          249 

attack  upon  it  through  the  stock  market  and  in  the  press, 
and  bought  it  again  at  a  low  figure,  holding  it  ready  to 
unload  when  the  public  should  have  forgotten. 

The  annual  advertising  expenditure  of  the  firearms 
trust  ran  into  millions  and  Sam's  hold  upon  the  press  of 
the  country  was  almost  unbelievably  strong.  Morrison 
rapidly  developed  unusual  daring  and  audacity  in  using 
this  instrument  and  making  it  serve  Sam's  ends.  He  sup 
pressed  facts,  created  illusions,  and  used  the  newspapers 
as  a  whip  to  crack  at  the  heels  of  congressmen,  senators, 
and  legislators,  of  the  various  states,  when  such  matters 
as  appropriation  for  firearms  came  before  them. 

And  Sam,  who  had  undertaken  the  consolidation  of 
the  firearms  companies,  having  a  dream  of  himself  as  a 
great  master  in  that  field,  a  sort  of  American  Krupp, 
rapidly  awoke  from  the  dream  to  take  the  bigger  chances 
for  gain  in  the  world  of  speculation.  Within  a  year  he 
dropped  Edwards  as  head  of  the  firearms  trust  and  in.  his 
place  put  Lewis,  with  Morrison  as  secretary  and  man 
ager  of  sales.  Guided  by  Sam  these  two,  like  the  little 
drygoods  merchant  of  the  old  Rainey  Company,  went 
from  capital  to  capital  and  from  city  to  city  making 
contracts,  influencing  news,  placing  advertising  contracts 
where  they  would  do  the  most  good,  fixing  men. 

And  in  the  meantime  Sam,  with  Webster,  a  banker 
named  Crofts  who  had  profited  largely  in  the  fire 
arms  merger,  and  sometimes  Morrison  or  Prince,  began 
a  series  of  stock  raids,  speculations  and  manipulations 
that  attracted  country-wide  attention,  and  became  known 
to  the  newspaper  reading  world  as  the  McPherson  Chi 
cago  crowd.  They  were  in  oil,  railroads,  coal,  western 
land,  mining,  timber  and  street  railways.  One  summer 
Sam,  with  Prince,  built,  ran  to  a  profit,  and  sold  to  ad 
vantage  a  huge  amusement  park.  Through  his  head  day 
after  day  marched  columns  of  figures,  ideas,  schemes, 
more  and  more  spectacular  opportunities  for  gain.  Some 


250          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

of  the  enterprises  in  which  he  engaged,  while  because 
of  their  size  they  seemed  more  dignified,  were  of  reality 
of  a  type  with  the  game  smuggling  of  his  South- Water- 
Street  days,  and  in  all  of  his  operations  it  was  his  old 
instinct  for  bargains  and  for  the  finding  of  buyers  to 
gether  with  Webster's  ability  for  carrying  through  ques 
tionable  deals  that  made  him  and  his  followers  almost 
constantly  successful  in  the  face  of  opposition  from  the 
more  conservative  business  and  financial  men  of  the 
city. 

Again  Sam  led  a  new  life,  owning  running  horses  at 
the  tracks,  memberships  in  many  clubs,  a  country  house 
in  Wisconsin  and  shooting  preserves  in  Texas.  He 
drank  steadily,  played  poker  for  big  stakes,  kept  in  the 
public  prints,  and  day  after  day  led  his  crew  upon  the 
high  seas  of  finance.  He  did  not  dare  think  and  in  his 
heart  he  was  sick  of  it,  sick  to  the  soul,  so  that  when 
thought  came  to  him  he  got  out  of  his  bed  to  seek 
roistering  companions  or,  getting  pen  and  paper,  sat 
for  hours  figuring  out  new  and  more  daring  schemes 
for  money  making.  The  great  forward  movement  in 
modern  industry  of  which  he  had  dreamed  of  being  a 
part  had  for  him  turned  out  to  be  a  huge  meaningless 
gamble  with  loaded  dice  against  a  credulous  public.  With 
his  followers  he  went  on  day  after  day  doing  deeds  with 
out  thought.  Industries  were  organised  and  launched, 
men  employed  and  thrown  out  of  employment,  towns 
wrecked  by  the  destruction  of  an  industry  and  other 
towns  made  by  the  building  of  other  industries.  At  a 
whim  of  his  a  thousand  men  began  building  a  city  on 
an  Indiana  sand  hill,  and  at  a  wave  of  his  hand  another 
thousand  men  of  an  Indiana  town  sold  their  homes,  with 
the  chicken  houses  in  the  back-yards  and  vines  trained 
by  the  kitchen  doors,  and  rushed  to  buy  sections  of  the 
hill  plotted  off  for  them.  He  did  not  stop  to  discuss 
with  his  followers  the  meaning  of  the  things  he  did.  He 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          251 

told  them  of  the  profits  to  be  made  and  then,  having 
done  the  thing,  he  went  with  them  to  drink  in  bar  rooms 
and  to  spend  the  evening  or  afternoon  singing  songs, 
visiting  his  stable  of  runners  or,  more  often,  sitting  si 
lently  about  the  card  table  playing  for  high  stakes.  Mak 
ing  millions  through  the  manipulation  of  the  public  dur 
ing  the  day,  he  sometimes  sat  half  the  night  struggling 
with  his  companions  for  the  possession  of  thousands. 

Lewis,  the  Jew,  the  only  one  of  Sam's  companions  who 
had  not  followed  him  in  his  spectacular  money  making, 
stayed  in  the  office  of  the  firearms  company  and  ran  it 
like  the  scientific  able  man  of  business  he  was.  While 
Sam  remained  chairman  of  the  board  of  the  company 
and  had  an  office,  a  desk,  and  the  name  of  leadership 
there,  he  let  Lewis  run  the  place,  and  spent  his  own  time 
upon  the  stock  exchange  or  in  some  corner  with  Webster 
and  Crofts  planning  some  new  money  making  raid. 

"You  have  the  better  of  it,  Lewis,"  he  said  one  day 
in  a  reflective  mood ;  "you  thought  I  had  cut  the  ground 
from  under  you  when  I  got  Tom  Edwards  but  I  only 
set  you  more  firmly  in  a  larger  place." 

He  made  a  movement  with  his  hand  toward  the  large 
general  offices  with  the  rows  of  busy  clerks  and  the  sub 
stantial  look  of  work  being  done. 

"I  might  have  had  the  work  you  are  doing.  I  planned 
and  schemed  with  that  end  in  view,"  he  added,  lighting 
a  cigar  and  going  out  at  the  door. 

"And  the  money  hunger  got  you,"  laughed  Lewis, 
looking  after  him,  "the  hunger  that  gets  Jews  and  Gen 
tiles  and  all  who  feed  it." 

One  might  have  come  upon  the  McPherson  Chicago 
crowd  about  the  old  Chicago  stock  exchange  on  any  day 
during  those  years,  Crofts,  tall,  abrupt  and  dogmatic; 
Morrison,  slender,  dandified  and  gracious ;  Webster,  well- 
dressed,  suave,  gentlemanly,  and  Sam,  silent,  restless  and 
often  morose  and  ugly.  Sometimes  it  seemed  to  Sam  that 


252          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

they  were  all  unreal,  himself  and  the  men  with  him.  He 
watched  his  companions  cunningly.  They  were  con 
stantly  posing  before  the  passing  crowd  of  brokers  and 
small  speculators.  Webster,  coming  up  to  him  on  the 
floor  of  the  exchange,  would  tell  him  of  a  snowstorm 
raging  outside  with  the  air  of  a  man  parting  with  a  Ipng- 
cherished  secret.  His  companions  went  from  one  to  the 
other  vowing  eternal  friendships,  and  then,  keeping  spies 
upon  each  other,  they  hurried  to  Sam  with  tales  of  secret 
betrayals.  Into  any  deal  proposed  by  him  they  went 
eagerly,  although  sometimes  fearfully,  and  almost  al 
ways  they  won.  And  with  Sam  they  made  millions 
through  the  manipulation  of  the  firearms  company,  and 
the  Chicago  and  Northern  Lake  Railroad  which  he  con 
trolled. 

In  later  years  Sam  looked  back  upon  it  all  as  a  kind 
of  nightmare.  It  seemed  to  him  that  never  during  that 
period  had  he  lived  or  thought  sanely.  The  great  finan 
cial  leaders  that  he  saw  were  not,  he  thought,  great  men. 
Some  of  them,  like  Webster,  were  masters  of  craft,  or, 
like  Morrison,  of  words,  but  for  the  most  part  they  were 
but  shrewd  greedy  vultures  feeding  upon  the  public  or 
upon  each  other. 

In  the  meantime  Sam  was  rapidly  degenerating.  His 
paunch  became  distended,  and  his  hands  trembled  in 
the  morning.  Being  a  man  of  strong  appetites,  and  hav 
ing  a  determination  to  avoid  women,  he  almost  con 
stantly  overdrank  and  overate,  and  in  the  leisure  hours 
that  came  to  him  he  hurried  eagerly  from  place  to  place, 
avoiding  thought,  avoiding  sane  quiet  talk,  avoiding 
himself. 

All  of  his  companions  did  not  suffer  equally.  Web 
ster  seemed  made  for  the  life,  thriving  and  expanding 
under  it,  putting  his  winnings  steadily  aside,  going  on 
Sunday  to  a  suburban  church,  avoiding  the  publicity  con 
necting  his  name  with  race  horses  and  big  sporting  events 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          253 

that  Crofts  sought  and  to  which  Sam  submitted.  One 
day  Sam  and  Crofts  caught  him  in  an  effort  to  sell  them 
out  to  a  group  of  New  York  bankers  in  a  mining  deal 
and  turned  the  trick  on  him  instead,  whereupon  he  went 
off  to  New  York  to  become  a  respectable  big  business 
man  and  the  friend  of  senators  and  philanthropists. 

Crofts  was  a  man  with  chronic  domestic  troubles,  one 
of  those  men  who  begin  each  day  by  cursing  their 
wives  before  their  associates  and  yet  continue  living  with 
them  year  after  year.  There  was  a  kind  of  rough  square 
ness  in  the  man,  and  after  the  completion  of  a  success 
ful  deal  he  would  be  as  happy  as  a  boy,  pounding  men 
on  the  back,  shaking  with  laughter,  throwing  money 
about,  making  crude  jokes.  After  Sam  left  Chicago  he 
finally  divorced  his  wife  and  married  an  actress  from 
the  vaudeville  stage  and  after  losing  two-thirds  of  his 
fortune  in  an  effort  to  capture  control  of  a  southern 
railroad,  went  to  England  and,  coached  by  the  actress 
wife,  developed  into  an  English  country  gentleman. 

And  Sam  was  a  man  sick.  Day  after  day  he  went 
on  drinking  more  and  more  heavily,  playing  for  bigger 
and  bigger  stakes,  allowing  himself  less  and  less  thought 
of  himself.  One  day  he  received  a  long  letter  from  John 
Telfer  telling  of  the  sudden  death  of  Mary  Underwood 
and  berating  him  for  his  neglect  of  her. 

"She  was  ill  for  a  year  and  without  an  income,"  wrote 
Telfer.  Sam  noticed  that  the  man's  hand  had  begun 
to  tremble.  "She  lied  to  me  and  told  me  you  had  sent 
her  money,  but  now  that  she  is  dead  I  find  that  though 
she  wrote  you  she  got  no  answer.  Her  old  aunt  told  me." 

Sam  put  the  letter  into  his  pocket  and  going  into  one 
of  his  clubs  began  drinking  with  a  crowd  of  men  he 
found  idling  there.  He  had  paid  little  attention  to  his 
correspondence  for  months.  No  doubt  the  letter  from 
Mary  had  been  received  by  his  secretary  and  thrown 
aside  with  the  letters  of  thousands  of  other  women,  beg- 


254         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

ging  letters,  amorous  letters,  letters  directed  at  him  be 
cause  of  his  wealth  and  the  prominence  given  his  exploits 
by  the  newspapers. 

After  wiring  an  explanation  and  mailing  a  check  the 
size  of  which  filled  John  Telfer  with  admiration,  Sam 
with  a  half  dozen  fellow  roisterers  spent  the  late  after 
noon  and  evening  going  from  saloon  to  saloon  through 
the  south  side.  When  he  got  to  his  apartments  late  that 
night,  his  head  was  reeling  and  his  mind  filled  with  dis 
torted  memories  of  drinking  men  and  women  and  of 
himself  standing  on  a  table  in  some  obscure  drinking 
place  and  calling  upon  the  shouting,  laughing  hangers-on 
of  his  crowd  of  rich  money  spenders  to  think  and  to  work 
and  to  seek  Truth. 

He  went  to  sleep  in  his  chair,  his  mind  filled  with  the 
dancing  faces  of  dead  women,  Mary  Underwood  and 
Janet  and  Sue,  tear-stained  faces  calling  to  him.  When 
he  awoke  and  shaved  he  went  out  into  the  street  and 
to  another  down-town  club. 

"I  wonder  if  Sue  is  dead,  too/'  he  muttered,  remem 
bering  his  dream. 

At  the  club  he  was  called  to  the  telephone  by  Lewis, 
who  asked  him  to  come  at  once  to  his  office  at  the  Ed 
wards  Consolidated.  When  he  got  there  he  found  a 
wire  from  Sue.  In  a  moment  of  loneliness  and  des 
pondency  over  the  loss  of  his  old  business  standing  and 
reputation,  Colonel  Tom  had  shot  himself  in  a  New  York 
hotel. 

Sam  sat  at  his  desk,  fingering  the  yellow  paper  lying 
before  him  and  fighting  to  get  his  head  clear. 

"The  old  coward.  The  damned  old  coward,"  he  mut 
tered;  "any  one  could  have  done  that." 

When  Lewis  came  into  Sam's  office  he  found  his  chief 
sitting  at  his  desk  fingering  the  telegram  and  muttering 
to  himself.  When  Sam  handed  him  the  wire  he  came 
around  and  stood  beside  Sam,  his  hand  upon  his  shoulder. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          255 

"Well,  do  not  blame  yourself  for  that,"  he  said,  with 
quick  understanding. 

"I  don't,"  Sam  muttered;  "I  do  not  blame  myself  for 
anything.  I  am  a  result,  not  a  cause.  I  am  trying  to 
think.  I  am  not  through  yet.  I  am  going  to  begin  again 
when  I  get  things  thought  out." 

Lewis  went  out  of  the  room  leaving  him  to  his 
thoughts.  For  an  hour  he  sat  there  reviewing  his  life. 
When  he  came  to  the  day  that  he  had  humiliated  Colonel 
Tom,  there  came  back  to  his  mind  the  sentence  he  had 
written  on  the  sheet  of  paper  while  the  vote  was  being 
counted.  "The  best  men  spend  their  lives  seeking 
truth." 

Suddenly  he  came  to  a  decision  and,  calling  Lewis, 
began  laying  out  a  plan  of  action.  His  head  cleared 
and  the  ring  came  back  into  his  voice.  To  Lewis  he 
gave  an  option  on  his  entire  holdings  of  Edwards  Con 
solidated  stocks  and  bonds  and  to  him  also  he  entrusted 
the  clearing  up  of  deal  after  deal  in  which  he  was  in 
terested.  Then,  calling  a  broker,  he  began  throwing  a 
mass  of  stock  on  the  market.  When  Lewis  told  him 
that  Crofts  was  'phoning  wildly  about  town  to  find  him, 
and  was  with  the  help  of  another  banker  supporting  the 
market  and  taking  Sam's  stocks  as  fast  as  offered,  he 
laughed  and  giving  Lewis  instructions  regarding  the 
disposal  of  his  monies  walked  out  of  the  office,  again  a 
free  man  and  again  seeking  the  answer  to  his  problem. 

He  made  no  attempt  to  answer  Sue's  wire.  He  was 
restless  to  get  at  something  he  had  in  his  mind.  He  went 
to  his  apartments  and  packed  a  bag  and  from  there  dis 
appeared  saying  good-bye  to  no  one.  In  his  mind  was 
no  definite  idea  of  where  he  was  going  or  what  he  was 
going  to  do.  He  knew  only  that  he  would  follow  the 
message  his  hand  had  written.  He  would  try  to  spend 
his  life  seeking  truth. 


BOOK  III 


CHAPTER  I 

ONE  day  when  the  youth  Sam  McPherson  was  new 
in  the  city  he  went  on  a  Sunday  afternoon  to  a  down-town 
theatre  to  hear  a  sermon.  The  sermon  was  delivered  by 
a  small  dark-skinned  Boston  man,  and  seemed  to  the 
young  McPherson  scholarly  and  well  thought  out. 

'The  greatest  man  is  he  whose  deeds  affect  the  greatest 
number  of  lives,"  the  speaker  had  said,  and  the  thought 
had  stuck  in  Sam's  mind.  Now  walking  along  the  street 
carrying  his  travelling  bag,  he  remembered  the  sermon 
and  the  thought  and  shook  his  head  in  doubt. 

"What  I  have  done  here  in  this  city  must  have  affected 
thousands  of  lives,"  he  mused,  and  felt  a  quickening  of 
his  blood  at  just  letting  go  of  his  thoughts  as  he  had  not 
dared  do  since  that  day  when,  by  breaking  his  word  to 
Sue,  he  had  started  on  his  career  as  a  business  giant. 

He  began  to  think  of  the  quest  on  which  he  had 
started  and  had  keen  satisfaction  in  the  thought  of  what 
he  should  do. 

"I  will  begin  all  over  and  come  up  to  Truth  through 
work,"  he  told  himself.  "I  will  leave  the  money  hunger 
behind  me,  and  if  it  returns  I  will  come  back  here  to 
Chicago  and  see  my  fortune  piled  up  and  the  men  rush 
ing  about  the  banks  and  the  stock  exchange  and  the 
court  they  pay  to  such  fools  and  brutes  as  I  have  been, 
and  that  will  cure  me." 

Into  the  Illinois  Central  Station  he  went,  a  strange 

257 


258          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

spectacle.  A  smile  came  to  his  lips  as  he  sat  on  a  bench 
along  the  wall  between  an  immigrant  from  Russia  and  a 
small  plump  farmer's  wife  who  held  a  banana  in  her 
hand  and  gave  bites  of  it  to  a  rosy-cheeked  babe  lying 
in  her  arms.  He,  an  American  multi-millionaire,  # 
man  in  the  midst  of  his  money-making,  one  who  had 
realised  the  American  dream,  to  have  sickened  at  the 
feast  and  to  have  wandered  out  of  a  fashionable  club 
with  a  bag  in  his  hand  and  a  roll  of  bills  in  his  pocket 
and  to  have  come  on  this  strange  quest — to  seek  Truth, 
to  seek  God.  A  few  years  of  the  fast  greedy  living  in 
the  city,  that  had  seemed  so  splendid  to  the  Iowa  boy 
and  to  the  men  and  women  who  had  lived  in  his  town, 
and  then  a  woman  had  died  lonely  and  in  want  in  that 
Iowa  town,  and  half  across  the  continent  a  fat  blustering 
old  man  had  shot  himself  in  a  New  York  hotel,  and 
here  he  sat. 

Leaving  his  bag  in  the  care  of  the  farmer's  wife,  he 
walked  across  the  room  to  the  ticket  window  and  standing 
there  watched  the  people  with  definite  destinations  in 
mind  come  up,  lay  down  money,  and  taking  their  tickets 
go  briskly  away.  He  had  no  fear  of  being  known.  Al 
though  his  name  and  his  picture  had  been  upon  the  front 
pages  of  Chicago  newspapers  for  years,  he  felt  so  great 
a  change  within  himself  from  just  the  resolution  he  had 
taken  that  he  had  no  doubt  of  passing  unnoticed. 

A  thought  struck  him.  Looking  up  and  down  the  long 
room  filled  with  its  strangely  assorted  clusters  of  men  and 
women  a  sense  of  the  great  toiling  masses  of  people,  the 
labourers,  the  small  merchants,  the  skilled  mechanics, 
came  over  him. 

"These  are  the  Americans,"  he  began  telling  himself, 
"these  people  with  children  beside  them  and  with  hard 
daily  work  to  be  done,  and  many  of  them  with  stunted 
or  imperfectly  developed  bodies,  not  Crofts,  not  Morri 
son  and  I,  but  these  others  who  toil  without  hope  of 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  259 

luxury  and  wealth,  who  make  up  the  armies  in  times  of 
war  and  raise  up  boys  and  girls  to  do  the  work  of  the 
world  in  their  turn." 

He  fell  into  the  line  moving  toward  the  ticket  window 
behind  a  sturdy-looking  old  man  who  carried  a  box  of 
carpenter  tools  in  one  hand  and  a  bag  in  the  other, 
and  bought  a  ticket  to  the  same  Illinois  town  to  which 
the  old  man  was  bound. 

In  the  train  he  sat  beside  the  old  man  and  the  two 
fell  into  quiet  talk — the  old  man  talking  of  his  family. 
He  had  a  son,  married  and  living  in  the  Illinois  town 
to  which  he  was  going,  of  whom  he  began  boasting. 
The  son,  he  said,  had  gone  to  that  town  and  had  pros 
pered  there,  owning  a  hotel  which  his  wife  managed 
while  he  worked  as  a  builder. 

"Ed,"  he  said,  "keeps  fifty  or  sixty  men  going  all 
summer.  He  has  sent  for  me  to  come  and  take  charge 
of  a  gang.  He  knows  well  enough  I  will  get  the  work 
out  of  them." 

From  Ed  the  old  man  drifted  into  talk  of  himself  and 
his  life,  telling  bare  facts  with  directness  and  simplicity 
and  making  no  effort  to  disguise  a  slight  turn  of  vanity 
in  his  success. 

"I  have  raised  seven  sons  and  made  them  all  good 
workmen  and  they  are  all  doing  well,"  he  said. 

He  told  of  each  in  detail.  One,  who  had  taken  to 
books,  was  a  mechanical  engineer  in  a  manufacturing 
town  in  New  England.  The  mother  of  his  children  had 
died  the  year  before  and  of  his  three  daughters  two  had 
married  mechanics.  The  third,  Sam  gathered,  had  not 
done  well  and  from  something  the  old  man  said  he 
thought  she  had  perhaps  gone  the  wrong  way  there  in 
Chicago. 

To  the  old  man  Sam  talked  of  God  and  of  a  man's 
effort  to  get  truth  out  of  life. 

"I  have  thought  of  it  a  lot,"  he  said. 


26o          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

The  old  man  was  interested.  He  looked  at  Sam 
and  then  out  at  the  car  window  and  began  talking  of 
his  own  beliefs,  the  substance  of  which  Sam  could  not 
get. 

"God  is  a  spirit  and  lives  in  the  growing  corn,"  said 
the  old  man,  pointing  out  the  window  at  the  passing 
fields. 

He  began  talking  of  churches  and  of  ministers,  against 
whom  he  was  filled  with  bitterness. 

"They  are  dodgers.  They  do  not  get  at  things.  They 
are  damned  dodgers,  pretending  to  be  good,"  he  de 
clared. 

Sam  talked  of  himself,  saying  that  he  was  alone  in 
the  world  and  had  money.  He  said  that  he  wanted  work 
in  the  open  air,  not  for  the  money  it  would  bring  him, 
but  because  his  paunch  was  large  and  his  hand  trembled 
in  the  morning. 

"I've  been  drinking,"  he  said,  "and  I  want  to  work 
hard  day  after  day  so  that  my  muscles  may  become  firm 
and  sleep  come  to  me  at  night." 

The  old  man  thought  that  his  son  could  find  Sam  a 
place. 

"He's  a  driver — Ed  is,"  he  said,  laughing,  "and  he 
won't  pay  you  much.  Ed  don't  let  go  of  money.  He's 
a  tight  one." 

Night  had  come  when  they  reached  the  town  where 
Ed  lived,  and  the  three  men  walked  over  a  bridge,  be 
neath  which  roared  a  waterfall,  toward  the  long  poorly- 
lighted  main  street  of  the  town  and  Ed's  hotel.  Ed,  a 
young,  broad-shouldered  man,  with  a  dry  cigar  stuck  in 
the  corner  of  his  mouth,  led  the  way.  He  had  engaged 
Sam  standing  in  the  darkness  on  the  station  platform,  ac 
cepting  his  story  without  comment. 

"I'll  let  you  carry  timbers  and  drive  nails,"  he  said, 
"that  will  harden  you  up." 

On  the  way  over  the  bridge  he  talked  of  the  town. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  261 

"It's  a  live  place/'  he  said,  "we  are  getting  people  in 
here." 

"Look  at  that!"  he  exclaimed,  chewing  at  the  cigar 
and  pointing  to  the  waterfall  that  foamed  and  roared  al 
most  under  the  bridge.  "There's  a  lot  of  power  there  and 
where  there's  power  there  will  be  a  city." 

At  Ed's  hotel  some  twenty  men  sat  about  a  long  low 
office.  They  were,  for  the  most  part,  middle-aged  work 
ing  men  and  sat  in  silence  reading  and  smoking  pipes. 
At  a  table  pushed  against  the  wall  a  bald-headed  young 
man  with  a  scar  on  his  cheek  played  solitaire  with  a  greasy 
pack  of  cards,  and  in  front  of  him  and  sitting  in  a  chair 
tilted  against  the  wall  a  sullen- faced  boy  idly  watched 
the  game.  When  the  three  men  came  into  the  office  the 
boy  dropped  his  chair  to  the  floor  and  stared  at  Ed  who 
stared  back  at  him.  It  was  as  though  a  contest  of  some 
sort  went  on  between  them.  A  tall  neatly-dressed  woman, 
with  a  brisk  manner  and  pale,  inexpressive,  hard  blue 
eyes,  stood  back  of  a  little  combined  desk  and  cigar  case 
at  the  end  of  the  room,  and  as  the  three  walked  toward 
her  she  looked  from  Ed  to  the  sullen-faced  boy  and  then 
again  at  Ed.  Sam  concluded  she  was  a  woman  bent  on 
having  her  own  way.  She  had  that  air. 

"This  is  my  wife,"  said  Ed,  introducing  Sam  with  a 
wave  of  his  hand  and  passing  around  the  end  of  the 
desk  to  stand  by  her  side. 

Ed's  wife  twirled  the  hotel  register  about  facing  Sam, 
nodded  her  head,  and  then,  leaning  over  the  desk,  be 
stowed  a  quick  kiss  upon  the  leathery  cheek  of  the  old 
carpenter. 

Sam  and  the  old  man  found  a  place  in  chairs  along 
the  wall  and  sat  down  among  the  silent  men.  The  old 
man  pointed  to  the  boy  in  the  chair  beside  the  card 
players. 

"Their  son,"  he  whispered  cautiously. 

The  boy  looked  at  his  mother,  who  in  turn  looked 


262          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

steadily  at  him,  and  got  up  from  his  chair.  Back  of  the 
desk  Ed  talked  in  low  tones  to  his  wife.  The  boy,  stop 
ping  before  Sam  and  the  old  man  and  still  looking  toward 
the  woman,  put  out  his  hand  which  the  old  man  took. 
Then,  without  speaking,  he  went  past  the  desk  and 
through  a  doorway,  and  began  noisily  climbing  a  flight 
of  stairs,  followed  by  his  mother.  As  they  climbed  they 
berated  each  other,  their  voices  rising  to  a  high  pitch  and 
echoing  through  the  upper  part  of  the  house. 

Ed,  coming  across  to  them,  talked  to  Sam  about  the 
assignment  of  a  room,  and  the  men  began  looking  at  the 
stranger;  noting  his  fine  clothes,  their  eyes  filled  with 
curiosity. 

"Selling  something?"  asked  a  large  red-haired  young 
man,  rolling  a  quid  of  tobacco  in  his  mouth. 

"No,"  replied  Sam  shortly,  "going  to  work  for  Ed." 

The  silent  men  in  chairs  along  the  wall  dropped  their 
newspapers  and  stared,  and  the  bald-headed  young  man 
at  the  table  sat  with  open  mouth,  a  card  held  suspended 
in  the  air.  Sam  had  become,  for  the  moment,  a  centre 
of  interest  and  the  men  stirred  in  their  chairs  and  began 
to  whisper  and  point  to  him. 

A  large,  watery-eyed  man,  with  florid  cheeks,  clad 
in  a  long  overcoat  with  spots  down  the  front,  came  in 
at  the  door  and  passed  through  the  room  bowing  and  smil 
ing  to  the  men.  Taking  Ed  by  the  arm  he  disappeared 
into  a  little  barroom,  where  Sam  could  hear  him  talking 
in  low  tones. 

After  a  little  while  the  florid-faced  man  came  and 
put  his  head  through  the  barroom  door  into  the  office. 

"Come  on,  boys,"  he  said,  smiling  and  nodding  right 
and  left,  "the  drinks  are  on  me." 

The  men  got  up  and  filed  into  the  bar,  the  old  man 
and  Sam  remaining  seated  in  their  chairs.  They  began 
talking  in  undertones. 

"I'll  start  'em  thinking — these  men,"  said  the  old  man. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          263 

From  his  pocket  he  took  a  pamphlet  and  gave  it  to 
Sam.  It  was  a  crudely  written  attack  upon  rich  men  and 
corporations. 

"Some  brains  in  the  fellow  who  wrote  that/'  said 
the  old  carpenter,  rubbing  his  hands  together  and  smil 
ing. 

Sam  did  not  think  so.  He  sat  reading  it  and  listening 
to  the  loud,  boisterous  voices  of  the  men  in  the  bar 
room.  The  florid-faced  man  was  explaining  the  details 
of  a  proposed  town  bond  issue.  Sam  gathered  that  the 
water  power  in  the  river  was  to  be  developed. 

"We  want  to  make  this  a  live  town,"  said  the  voice 
of  Ed,  earnestly. 

The  old  man,  leaning  over  and  putting  his  hand  beside 
his  mouth,  began  whispering  to  Sam. 

"I'll  bet  there  is  a  capitalist  deal  back  of  that  power 
scheme,"  he  said. 

He  nodded  his  head  up  and  down  and  smiled  know 
ingly. 

"If  there  is  Ed  will  be  in  on  it,"  he  added.  "You  can't 
lose  Ed.  He's  a  slick  one." 

He  took  the  pamphlet  from  Sam's  hand  and  put  it  in 
his  pocket. 

"I'm  a  socialist,"  he  explained,  "but  don't  say  anything. 
Ed's  against  'em." 

The  men  filed  back  into  the  room,  each  with  a  freshly- 
lighted  cigar  in  his  mouth,  and  the  florid-faced  man  fol 
lowed  them  and  went  out  at  the  office  door. 

"Well,  so  long,  boys,"  he  shouted  heartily. 

Ed  went  silently  up  the  stairs  to  join  the  mother  and 
boy,  whose  voices  could  still  be  heard  raised  in  outbursts 
of  wrath  from  above  as  the  men  took  their  former  chairs 
along  the  wall. 

"Well,  Bill's  sure  all  right,"  said  the  red-haired  young 
man,  evidently  expressing  the  opinion  of  the  men  in  re 
gard  to  the  florid-faced  man. 


264          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

A  small  bent  old  man  with  sunken  cheeks  got  up  and 
walking  across  the  room  leaned  against  the  cigar  case. 

"Did  you  ever  hear  this  one?"  he  asked,  looking  about. 

Obviously  no  answer  could  be  given  and  the  bent 
old  man  launched  into  a  vile  pointless  anecdote  of  a 
woman,  a  miner,  and  a  mule,  the  crowd  giving  close  at 
tention  and  laughing  uproariously  when  he  had  finished. 
The  socialist  rubbed  his  hands  together  and  joined  in  the 
applause. 

"That  was  a  good  one,  eh?"  he  commented,  turning 
to  Sam. 

Sam,  picking  up  his  bag,  climbed  the  stairway  as  the 
red-haired  young  man  launched  into  another  tale,  slightly 
less  vile.  In  his  room  to  which  Ed,  meeting  him  at  the 
top  of  the  stairs,  led  him,  still  chewing  at  the  unlighted 
cigar,  he  turned  out  the  light  and  sat  on  the  edge  of  the 
bed.  He  was  as  homesick  as  a  boy. 

"Truth,"  he  muttered,  looking  through  the  window  to 
the  dimly-lighted  street.  "Do  these  men  seek  truth?" 

The  next  day  he  went  to  work,  wearing  a  suit  of 
clothes  bought  from  Ed.  He  worked  with  Ed's  father, 
carrying  timbers  and  driving  nails  as  directed  by  him. 
In  the  gang  with  him  were  four  men,  boarders  at  Ed's 
hotel,  and  four  other  men  who  lived  in  the  town  with 
their  families.  At  the  noon  hour  he  asked  the  old  car 
penter  how  the  men  from  the  hotel,  who  did  not  live  in 
the  town,  could  vote  on  the  question  of  the  power  bonds. 
The  old  man  grinned  and  rubbed  his  hands  together. 

"I  don't  know,"  he  said.  "I  suppose  Ed  tends  to  that. 
He's  a  slick  one,  Ed  is." 

At  work,  the  men  who  had  been  so  silent  in  the  office 
of  the  hotel  were  alert  and  wonderfully  busy,  hurrying 
here  and  there  at  a  word  from  the  old  man  and  sawing 
and  nailing  furiously.  They  seemed  bent  upon  outdoing 
each  other  and  when  one  fell  behind  they  laughed  and 
shouted  at  him,  asking  him  if  he  had  decided  to  quit  for 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          265 

the  day.  But  though  they  seemed  determined  to  outdo 
him  the  old  man  kept  ahead  of  them  all,  his  hammer 
beating  a  rattling  tatoo  upon  the  boards  all  day.  At  the 
noon  hour  he  had  given  each  of  the  men  one  of  the  pam 
phlets  from  his  pocket  and  on  the  Way  back  to  his  hotel 
in  the  evening  he  told  Sam  that  the  others  had  tried  to 
show  him  up. 

"They  wanted  to  see  if  I  had  juice  in  me,"  he  ex 
plained,  strutting  beside  Sam  with  an  amusing  little 
swagger  of  his  shoulders. 

Sam  was  sick  with  fatigue.  His  hands  were  blistered, 
his  legs  felt  weak  and  a  terrible  thirst  burned  in  his 
throat.  All  day  he  had  gone  grimly  ahead,  thankful 
for  every  physical  discomfort,  every  throb  of  his  strained 
tired  muscles.  In  his  weariness  and  in  his  efforts  to  keep 
pace  with  the  others  he  had  forgotten  Colonel  Tom 
and  Mary  Underwood. 

All  during  that  month  and  into  the  next  Sam  stayed 
with  the  old  man's  gang.  He  ceased  thinking,  and  only 
worked  desperately.  An  odd  feeling  of  loyalty  and  de 
votion  to  the  old  man  came  over  him  and  he  felt  that 
he  too  must  prove  that  he  had  the  juice  in  him.  At  the 
hotel  he  went  to  bed  immediately  after  the  silent  dinner, 
slept,  awoke  aching,  and  went  to  work  again. 

One  Sunday  one  of  the  men  of  his  gang  came  to  Sam's 
room  and  invited  him  to  go  with  a  party  of  the  workers 
into  the  country.  They  went  in  boats,  carrying  with 
them  kegs  of  beer,  to  a  deep  ravine  clothed  on  both  sides 
by  heavy  woods.  In  the  boat  with  Sam  sat  the  red-haired 
young  man,  who  was  called  Jake  and  who  talked  loudly 
of  the  time  they  would  have  in  the  woods,  and  boasted 
that  he  was  the  instigator  of  the  trip. 

"I  thought  of  it,"  he  said  over  and  over  again. 

Sam  wondered  why  he  had  been  invited.  It  was  a 
soft  October  day  and  in  the  ravine  he  sat  looking  at  the 
trees  splashed  with  colour  and  breathing  deeply  of  the 


266          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

air,  his  whole  body  relaxed,  grateful  for  the  day  of  rest. 
Jake  came  and  sat  beside  him. 

"What  are  you?"  he  asked  bluntly.  "We  know  you 
are  no  working  man." 

Sam  told  him  a  half-truth. 

"You  are  right  enough  about  that;  I  have  money 
enough  not  to  have  to  work.  I  used  to  be  a  business 
man.  I  sold  guns.  But  I  have  a  disease  and  the  doc 
tors  have  told  me  that  if  I  do  not  work  out  of  doors  part 
of  me  will  die." 

The  man  from  his  own  gang  who  had  invited  him  on 
the  trip  came  up  to  them,  bringing  Sam  a  foaming  glass 
of  beer.  He  shook  his  head. 

"The  doctor  says  it  will  not  do,"  he  explained  to  the 
two  men. 

The  red-haired  man  called  Jake  began  talking. 

"We  are  going  to  have  a  fight  with  Ed,"  he  said. 
"That's  what  we  came  up  here  to  talk  about.  We  want 
to  know  where  you  stand.  We  are  going  to  see  if  we 
can't  make  him  pay  as  well  for  the  work  here  as  men 
are  paid  for  the  same  work  in  Chicago." 

Sam  lay  back  upon  the  grass. 

"All  right,"  he  said.  "Go  ahead.  If  I  can  help  I  will. 
I'm  not  so  fond  of  Ed." 

The  men  began  talking  among  themselves.  Jake, 
standing  among  them,  read  aloud  a  list  of  names  among 
which  was  the  name  Sam  had  written  on  the  register  at 
Ed's  hotel. 

"It's  a  list  of  the  names  of  men  we  think  will  stick 
together  and  vote  together  on  the  bond  issue,"  he  ex 
plained,  turning  to  Sam.  "Ed's  in  that  and  we  want  to 
use  our  votes  to  scare  him  into  giving  us  what  we  want. 
Will  you  stay  with  us?  You  look  like  a  fighter." 

Sam  nodded  and  getting  up  joined  the  men  about  the 
beer  kegs.  They  began  talking  of  Ed  and  of  the  money 
he  had  made  in  the  town. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  267 

"He's  done  a  lot  of  town  work  here  and  there's  been 
graft  in  all  of  it,"  explained  Jake  emphatically.  "It's 
time  he  was  being  made  to  do  the  right  thing." 

While  they  talked  Sam  sat  watching  the  men's  faces. 
They  did  not  seem  vile  to  him  now  as  they  had  seemed 
that  first  evening  in  the  hotel  office.  He  began  thinking 
of  them  silently  and  alertly  at  work  all  day  long,  sur 
rounded  by  such  influences  as  Ed  and  Bill,  and  the 
thought  sweetened  his  opinion  of  them. 

"Look  here,"  he  said,  "tell  me  of  this  matter.  I  was 
a  business  man  before  I  came  here  and  I  may  be  able  to 
help  you  fellows  get  what  you  want." 

Getting  up,  Jake  took  Sam's  arm  and  they  walked 
down  the  ravine,  Jake  explaining  the  situation  in  the 
town. 

"The  game,"  he  said,  "is  to  make  the  taxpayers  pay 
for  a  millrace  to  be  built  for  the  development  of  the 
water  power  in  the  river  and  then,  by  a  trick,  to  turn 
it  over  to  a  private  company.  Bill  and  Ed  are  both 
in  the  deal  and  they  are  working  for  a  Chicago  man 
named  Crofts.  He's  been  up  here  at  the  hotel  with  Bill 
talking  to  Ed.  I've  figured  out  what  they  are  up  to." 
Sam  sat  down  upon  a  log  and  laughed  heartily. 

"Crofts,  eh?"  he  exclaimed.  "Say,  we  will  fight  this 
thing.  If  Crofts  has  been  up  here  you  can  depend  upon 
it  there  is  some  size  to  the  deal.  We  will  just  smash  the 
whole  crooked  gang  for  the  good  of  the  town." 

"How  would  you  do  that?"  asked  Jake. 

Sam  sat  down  on  a  log  and  looked  at  the  river  flowing 
past  the  mouth  of  the  ravine. 

"Just  fight,"  he  said.  "Let  me  show  you  some 
thing." 

He  took  a  pencil  and  slip  of  paper  from  his  pocket, 
and,  with  the  voices  of  the  men  about  the  beer  kegs  in 
his  ears  and  the  red-haired  man  peering  over  his  shoulder, 
began  writing  his  first  political  pamphlet.  He  wrote 


268          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

and  erased  and  changed  words  and  phrases.  The  pam 
phlet  was  a  statement  of  facts  as  to  the  value  of  water 
power,  and  was  addressed  to  the  taxpayers  of  the  com 
munity.  He  warmed  to  the  subject,  saying  that  a  for 
tune  lay  sleeping  in  the  river,  and  that  the  town,  by  the 
exercise  of  a  little  discretion  now,  could  build  with  that 
fortune  a  beautiful  city  belonging  to  the  people. 

"This  fortune  in  the  river  rightly  managed  will  pay 
the  expenses  of  government  and  give  you  control  of  a 
great  source  of  revenue  forever,"  he  wrote.  "Build  your 
millrace,  but  look  out  for  a  trick  of  the  politicians.  They 
are  trying  to  steal  it.  Reject  the  offer  of  the  Chicago 
banker  named  Crofts.  Demand  an  investigation.  A 
capitalist  has  been  found  who  will  take  the  water  power 
bonds  at  four  per  cent  and  back  the  people  in  this  fight 
for  a  free  American  city."  Across  the  head  of  the 
pamphlet  Sam  wrote  the  caption,  "A  River  Paved  With 
Gold,"  and  handed  it  to  Jake,  who  read  it  and  whistled 
softly. 

"Good !"  he  said.  "I  will  take  this  and  have  it  printed. 
It  will  make  Bill  and  Ed  sit  up." 

Sam  took  a  twenty-dollar  bill  from  his  pocket  and 
gave  it  to  the  man. 

"To  pay  for  the  printing,"  he  said.  "And  when  we 
have  them  licked  I  am  the  man  who  will  take  the  four 
per  cent  bonds." 

Jake  scratched  his  head.  "How  much  do  you  sup 
pose  the  deal  is  worth  to  Crofts?" 

"A  million,  or  he  would  not  bother,"  Sam  answered. 

Jake  folded  the  paper  and  put  it  in  his  pocket. 

"This  would  make  Bill  and  Ed  squirm,  eh?"  he 
laughed. 

Going  home  down  the  river  the  men,  filled  with  beer, 
sang  and  shouted  as  the  boats,  guided  by  Sam  and  Jake, 
floated  along.  The  night  fell  warm  and  still  and  Sam 
thought  he  had  never  seen  the  sky  so  filled  with  stars. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  269 

His  brain  was  busy  with  the  idea  of  doing  something  for 
the  people. 

"Perhaps  here  in  this  town  I  shall  make  a  start  toward 
what  I  am  after/3  he  thought,  his  heart  filled  with  happi 
ness  and  the  songs  of  the  tipsy  workmen  ringing  in  his 
ears. 

All  through  the  next  few  weeks  there  was  an  air  of 
something  astir  among  the  men  of  Sam's  gang  and  about 
Ed's  hotel.  During  the  evening  Jake  went  among  the 
men  talking  in  low  tones,  and  once  he  took  a  three  days' 
vacation,  telling  Ed  that  he  did  not  feel  well  and  spending 
the  time  among  the  men  employed  in  the  plough  works 
up  the  river.  From  time  to  time  he  came  to  Sam  for 
money. 

"For  the  campaign/'  he  said,  winking  and  hurrying 
away. 

Suddenly  a  speaker  appeared  and  began  talking  nightly 
from  a  box  before  a  drug  store  on  Main  Street,  and 
after  dinner  the  office  of  Ed's  hotel  was  deserted.  The 
man  on  the  box  had  a  blackboard  hung  on  a  pole,  on 
which  he  drew  figures  estimating  the  value  of  the  power 
in  the  river,  and  as  he  talked  he  grew  more  and  more 
excited,  waving  his  arms  and  inveighing  against  certain 
leasing  clauses  in  the  bond  proposal.  He  declared  him 
self  a  follower  of  Karl  Marx  and  delighted  the  old  car 
penter  who  danced  up  and  down  in  the  road  and  rubbed 
his  hands. 

"It  will  come  to  something — this  will — you'll  see/'  he 
declared  to  Sam. 

One  day  Ed  appeared,  riding  in  a  buggy,  at  the  job 
where  Sam  worked,  and  called  the  old  man  into  the  road. 
He  sat  pounding  one  hand  upon  the  other  and  talking  in 
a  low  voice.  Sam  thought  the  old  man  had  perhaps  been 
indiscreet  in  the  distribution  of  the  socialistic  pamphlets. 
He  seemed  nervous,  dancing  up  and  down  beside  the 
buggy  and  shaking  his  head.  Then  hurrying  back  to 


270          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

where  the  men  worked  he  pointed  over  his  shoulder  with 
his  thumb. 

"Ed  wants  you,"  he  said,  and  Sam  noticed  that  his 
voice  trembled  and  his  hand  shook. 

In  the  buggy  Ed  and  Sam  rode  in  silence.  Again  Ed 
chewed  at  an  unlighted  cigar. 

"I  want  to  talk  with  you/'  he  had  said  as  Sam  climbed 
into  the  buggy. 

At  the  hotel  the  two  men  got  out  of  the  buggy  and 
went  into  the  office.  Inside  the  door  Ed,  who  came 
behind,  sprang  forward  and  pinioned  Sam's  arms  with 
his  own.  He  was  as  powerful  as  a  bear.  His  wife, 
the  tall  woman  with  the  inexpressive  eyes,  came  running 
into  the  room,  her  face  drawn  with  hatred.  In 
her  hand  she  carried  a  broom  and  with  the  handle  of 
this  she  struck  Sam  several  swinging  blows  across  the 
face,  accompanying  each  blow  with  a  half  scream  of  rage 
and  a  volley  of  vile  names.  The  sullen- faced  boy,  alive 
now  and  with  eyes  burning  with  zeal,  came  running  down 
the  stairs  and  pushed  the  woman  aside.  He  struck  Sam 
time  after  time  in  the  face  with  his  fist,  laughing  each 
time  as  Sam  winced  under  the  blows. 

Sam  struggled  furiously  to  escape  Ed's  powerful  grasp. 
It  was  the  first  time  he  had  ever  been  beaten  and  the 
first  time  he  had  faced  hopeless  defeat.  The  wrath  within 
him  was  so  intense  that  the  jolting  impact  of  the  blows 
seemed  a  secondary  matter  to  the  need  of  escaping  Ed's 
vice-like  grasp. 

Suddenly  Ed  turned  and,  pushing  Sam  before  him, 
threw  him  through  the  office  door  and  into  the  street. 
In  falling  his  head  struck  against  a  hitching  post  and 
he  lay  stunned.  When  he  partially  recovered  from  the 
fall  Sam  got  up  and  walked  along  the  street.  His  face 
was  swollen  and  bruised  and  his  nose  bled.  The  street 
was  deserted  and  the  assault  upon  him  had  been  un 
noticed. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          271 

He  went  to  a  hotel  on  Main  Street — a  more  pretentious 
place  than  Ed's,  near  the  bridge  leading  to  the  station — 
and  as  he  passed  in  he  saw,  through  an  open  door,  Jake, 
the  red-haired  man,  leaning  against  the  bar  and  talking 
to  Bill,  the  man  with  the  florid  face.  Sam,  paying  for 
a  room,  went  upstairs  and  to  bed. 

In  the  bed,  with  cold  bandages  on  his  bruised  face, 
he  tried  to  get  the  situation  in  hand.  Hatred  for  Ed 
ran  through  his  veins.  His  hands  clenched,  his  brain 
whirled  and  the  brutal,  passionate  faces  of  the  woman 
and  the  boy  danced  before  his  eyes. 

"I'll  fix  them,  the  brutal  bullies,"  he  muttered  aloud. 

And  then  the  thought  of  his  quest  came  back  to  his 
mind  and  quieted  him.  Through  the  window  came  the 
roar  of  the  waterfall,  broken  by  noises  of  the  street. 
As  he  fell  asleep  they  mingled  with  his  dreams,  sounding 
soft  and  quiet  like  the  low  talk  of  a  family  about  the  fire 
of  an  evening. 

He  was  awakened  by  a  noise  of  pounding  on  his  door. 
At  his  call  the  door  opened  and  the  face  of  the  old  car 
penter  appeared.  Sam  laughed  and  sat  up  in  bed.  Al 
ready  the  cold  bandages  had  soothed  the  throbbing  of 
his  bruised  face. 

"Go  away,"  begged  the  old  man,  rubbing  his  hands 
together  nervously.  "Get  out  of  town." 

He  put  his  hand  to  his  mouth  and  talked  in  a  hoarse 
whisper,  looking  back  over  his  shoulder  through  the  open 
door.  Sam,  getting  out  of  bed,  began  filling  his  pipe. 

"You  can't  beat  Ed,  you  fellows,"  added  the  old  man, 
backing  out  at  the  door.  "He's  a  slick  one,  Ed  is.  You 
better  get  out  of  town." 

Sam  called  a  boy  and  gave  him  a  note  to  Ed  asking 
for  his  clothes  and  for  the  bag  in  his  room,  and  to  the- 
boy  he  gave  a  large  bill,  asking  him  to  pay  anything 
due.  When  the  boy  came  back  bringing  the  clothes  and 
the  bag  he  returned  the  bill  unbroken. 


272          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

"They're  scared  about  something  up  there,"  he  said, 
looking  at  Sam's  bruised  face. 

Sam  dressed  carefully  and  went  down  into  the 
street.  He  remembered  that  he  had  never  seen  a  printed 
copy  of  the  political  pamphlet  written  in  the  ravine  and 
realised  that  Jake  had  used  it  to  make  money  for  him 
self. 

"Now  I  shall  try  something  else,"  he  thought. 

It  was  early  evening  and  crowds  of  men  coming  down 
the  railroad  track  from  the  plough  works  turned  to  right 
and  left  as  they  reached  Main  Street.  Sam  walked 
among  them,  climbing  a  little  hilly  side  street  to  a  num 
ber  he  had  got  from  a  clerk  at  the  drug  store  before 
which  the  socialist  had  talked.  He  stopped  at  a  little 
frame  house  and  a  moment  after  knocking  was  in  the 
presence  of  the  man  who  had  talked  night  after  night 
from  the  box  in  the  street.  Sam  had  decided  to  see 
what  could  be  done  through  him.  The  socialist  was  a 
short,  fat  man,  with  curly  grey  hair,  shiny  round  cheeks, 
and  black  broken  teeth.  He  sat  on  the  edge  of  his  bed 
and  looked  as  if  he  had  slept  in  his  clothes.  A  corncob 
pipe  lay  smoking  among  the  covers  of  the  bed,  and  dur 
ing  most  of  the  talk  he  sat  with  one  shoe  held  in  his 
hand  as  though  about  to  put  it  on.  About  the  room  in 
orderly  piles  lay  stack  after  stack  of  paper-covered  books. 
Sam  sat  down  in  a  chair  by  the  window  and  told  his 
mission. 

"It  is  a  big  thing,  this  power  steal  that  is  going  on 
here,"  he  explained.  "I  know  the  man  back  of  it  and 
he  would  not  bother  with  a  small  affair.  I  know  they 
are  going  to  make  the  city  build  the  millrace  and  then 
steal  it.  It  will  be  a  big  thing  for  your  party  about  here 
if  you  take  hold  and  stop  them.  Let  me  tell  you  how  it 
can  be  done." 

He  explained  his  plan,  and  told  of  Crofts  and  of  his 
wealth  and  dogged,  bullying  determination.  The  socialist 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          273 

seemed  beside  himself.  He  pulled  on  the  shoe  and  began 
running  hurriedly  about  the  room. 

"The  time  for  the  election,"  Sam  went  on,  "is  almost 
here.  I  have  looked  into  this  thing.  We  must  beat  this 
bond  issue  and  then  put  through  a  square  one.  There  is 
a  train  out  of  Chicago  at  seven  o'clock,  a  fast  train. 
You  get  fifty  speakers  out  here.  I  will  pay  for  a  special 
train  if  necessary  and  I  will  hire  a  band  and  help  stir 
things  up.  I  can  give  you  facts  enough  to  shake  this 
town  to  the  bottom.  You  come  with  me  and  'phone  to 
Chicago.  I  will  pay  everything.  I  am  McPherson,  Sam 
McPherson  of  Chicago." 

The  socialist  ran  to  a  closet  and  began  pulling  on  his 
coat  The  name  affected  him  so  that  his  hand  trembled 
and  he  could  scarcely  get  his  arm  into  the  coat  sleeve. 
He  began  to  apologise  for  the  appearance  of  the  room 
and  kept  looking  at  Sam  with  the  air  of  one  not  able 
to  believe  what  he  had  heard.  As  the  two  men  walked 
out  of  the  house  he  ran  ahead  holding  doors  open  for 
Sam's  passage. 

"And  you  will  help  us,  Mr.  McPherson?"  he  ex 
claimed.  "You,  a  man  of  millions,  will  help  us  in  this 
fight?" 

Sam  had  a  feeling  that  the  man  was  going  to  kiss 
his  hand  or  do  something  equally  ridiculous.  He  had 
the  air  of  a.club  door  man  gone  off  his  head. 

At  the  hotel  Sam  stood  in  the  lobby  while  the  fat  man 
waited  in  a  telephone  booth. 

"I  will  have  to  'phone  Chicago,  I  will  simply  have  to 
'phone  Chicago.  We  socialists  don't  do  anything  like 
this  offhand,  Mr.  McPherson,"  he  had  explained  as  they 
walked  along  the  street. 

When  the  socialist  came  out  of  the  booth  he  stood 
before  Sam  shaking  his  head.  His  whole  attitude  had 
changed,  and  he  looked  like  a  man  caught  doing  a  foolish 
or  absurd  thing. 


274          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

"Nothing  doing,  nothing  doing,  Mr.  McPherson,"  he 
said,  starting  for  the  hotel  door. 

At  the  door  he  stopped  and  shook  his  finger  at  Sam. 

"It  won't  work,"  he  said,  emphatically.  "Chicago  is 
too  wise." 

Sam  turned  and  went  back  to  his  room.  His  name 
had  killed  his  only  chance  to  beat  Crofts,  Jake,  Bill  and 
Ed.  In  his  room  he  sat  looking  out  of  the  window  into 
the  street. 

"Where  shall  I  take  hold  now?"  he  asked  himself. 

Turning  out  the  lights  he  sat  listening  to  the  roar  of 
the  waterfall  and  thinking  of  the  events  of  the  last 
week. 

"I  have  had  a  time/'  he  thought.  "I  have  tried  some 
thing  and  even  though  it  did  not  work  it  has  been  the 
best  fun  I  have  had  for  years." 

The  hours  slipped  away  and  night  came  on.  He  could 
hear  men  shouting  and  laughing  in  the  street,  and  going 
downstairs  he  stood  in  a  hallway  at  the  edge  of  the 
crowd  that  gathered  about  the  socialist.  The  orator 
shouted  and  waved  his  hand.  He  seemed  as  proud  as 
a  young  recruit  who  has  just  passed  through  his  first 
baptism  of  fire. 

"He  tried  to  make  a  fool  of  me — McPherson  of  Chi 
cago — the  millionaire — one  of  the  capitalist  kings — he 
tried  to  bribe  me  and  my  party." 

In  the  crowd  the  old  carpenter  was  dancing  in  the 
road  and  rubbing  his  hands  together.  With  the  feeling 
of  a  man  who  had  finished  a  piece  of  work  or  turned 
the  last  leaf  of  a  book,  Sam  went  back  to  his  hotel. 

"In  the  morning  I  shall  be  on  my  way,"  he  thought. 

A  knock  came  at  the  door  and  the  red-haired  man 
came  in.  He  closed  the  door  softly  and  winked  at  Sam. 

"Ed  made  a  mistake,"  he  said,  and  laughed.  "The 
old  man  told  him  you  were  a  socialist  and  he  thought  you 
were  trying  to  spoil  the  graft.  He  is  scared  about  that 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          275 

beating  you  got  and  mighty  sorry.  He's  all  right — Ed 
is — and  he  and  Bill  and  I  have  got  the  votes.  What 
made  you  stay  under  cover  so  long?  Why  didn't  you 
tell  us  you  were  McPherson?" 

Sam  saw  the  hopelessness  of  any  attempt  to  explain. 
Jake  had  evidently  sold  out  the  men.  Sam  wondered 
how. 

"How  do  you  know  you  can  deliver  the  votes?"  he 
asked,  trying  to  lead  Jake  on. 

Jake  rolled  the  quid  in  his  mouth  and  winked  again. 

"It  was  easy  enough  to  fix  the  men  when  Ed,  Bill 
and  I  got  together,"  he  said.  "You  know  about  the 
other.  There's  a  clause  in  the  act  authorising  the  bond 
issue,  a  sleeper,  Bill  calls  it.  You  know  more  about  that 
than  I  do.  Anyway  the  power  will  be  turned  over  to 
the  man  we  say." 

"But  how  do  I  know  you  can  deliver  the  votes?" 

Jake  threw  out  his  hand  impatiently. 

"What  do  they  know  ?"  he  asked  sharply.  "What  they 
want  is  more  wages.  There's  a  million  in  the  power 
deal  and  they  can't  any  more  realise  a  million  than  they 
can  tell  what  they  want  to  do  in  Heaven.  I  promised 
Ed's  fellows  the  city  scale.  Ed  can't  kick.  He'll  make 
a  hundred  thousand  as  it  stands.  Then  I  promised  the 
plough  works  gang  a  ten  per  cent  raise.  We'll  get  it  for 
them  if  we  can,  but  if  we  can't,  they  won't  know  it  till 
the  deal  is  put  through." 

Sam  walked  over  and  held  open  the  door. 

"Good  night,"  he  said. 

Jake  looked  annoyed. 

"Ain't  you  even  going  to  make  a  bid  against  Crofts?" 
he  asked.  "We  ain't  tied  to  him  if  you  do  better  by  us. 
I'm  in  this  thing  because  you  put  me  in.  That  piece  you 
wrote  up  the  river  scared  'em  stiff.  I  want  to  do  the 
right  thing  by  you.  Don't  be  sore  about  Ed.  He 
wouldn't  a  done  it  if  he'd  known." 


276          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

Sam  shook  his  head  and  stood  with  his  hand  still  on 
the  door. 

"Good  night,"  he  said  again.  "I  am  not  in  it.  I  have 
dropped  it.  No  use  trying  to  explain." 


CHAPTER  II 

FOR  weeks  and  months  Sam  led  a  wandering  vaga 
bond  life,  and  surely  a  stranger  or  more  restless  vaga 
bond  never  went  upon  the  road.  In  his  pocket  he  had 
at  almost  any  time  from  one  to  five  thousand  dollars,  his 
bag  went  on  from  place  to  place  ahead  of  him,  and  now 
and  then  he  caught  up  with  it,  unpacked  it,  and  wore  a 
suit  of  his  former  Chicago  clothes  upon  the  streets  of 
some  town.  For  the  most  part,  however,  he  wore  the 
rough  clothes  bought  from  Ed,  and,  when  these  were 
gone,  others  like  them,  with  a  warm  canvas  outer  jacket, 
and  for  rough  weather  a  pair  of  heavy  boots  lacing  half 
way  up  the  legs.  Among  the  people,  he  passed  for  a 
rather  well-set-up  workman  with  money  in  his  pocket 
going  his  own  way. 

During  all  those  months  of  wandering,  and  evert 
when  he  had  returned  to  something  nearer  his  former 
way  of  life,  his  mind  was  unsettled  and  his  outlook  on 
life  disturbed.  Sometimes  it  seemed  to  him  that  he, 
among  all  men,  was  a  unique,  an  innovation.  Day  after 
day  his  mind  ground  away  upon  his  problem  and  he 
was  determined  to  seek  and  to  keep  on  seeking  until  he 
found  for  himself  a  way  of  peace.  In  the  towns  and 
in  the  country  through  which  he  passed  he  saw  the  clerks 
in  the  stores,  the  merchants  with  worried  faces  hurrying 
into  banks,  the  farmers,  brutalised  by  toil,  dragging  their 
weary  bodies  homeward  at  the  coming  of  night,  and 
told  himself  that  all  life  was  abortive,  that  on  all  sides 
of  him  it  wore  itself  out  in  little  futile  efforts  or  ran 
away  in  side  currents,  that  nowhere  did  it  move  steadily, 

277 


278          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

continuously  forward  giving  point  to  the  tremendous 
sacrifice  involved  in  just  living  and  working  in  the  world. 
He  thought  of  Christ  going  about  seeing  the  world 
and  talking  to  men,  and  thought  that  he  too  would  go 
and  talk  to  them,  not  as  a  teacher,  but  as  one  seeking 
eagerly  to  be  taught.  At  times  he  was  filled  with  long 
ing  and  inexpressible  hopes  and,  like  the  boy  of  Caxton, 
would  get  out  of  bed,  not  now  to  stand  in  Miller's  pas 
ture  watching  the  rain  on  the  surface  of  the  water,  but 
to  walk  endless  miles  through  the  darkness  getting  the 
blessed  relief  of  fatigue  into  his  body  and  often  paying 
for  and  occupying  two  beds  in  one  night. 

Sam  wanted  to  go  back  to  Sue;  he  wanted  peace  and 
something  like  happiness,  but  most  of  all  he  wanted 
work,  real  work,  work  that  would  demand  of  him  day 
after  day  the  best  and  finest  in  him  so  that  he  would 
be  held  to  the  need  of  renewing  constantly  the  better 
impulses  of  his  mind.  He  was  at  the  top  of  his  life, 
and  the  few  weeks  of  hard  physical  exertion  as  a  driver 
of  nails  and  a  bearer  of  timbers  had  begun  to  restore 
his  body  to  shapeliness  and  strength,  so  that  he  was 
filled  anew  with  all  of  his  native  restlessness  and  energy ; 
but  he  was  determined  that  he  would  not  again  pour 
himself  out  in  work  that  would  react  upon  him  as  had 
his  money  making,  his  dream  of  beautiful  children,  and 
this  last  half-formed  dream  of  a  kind  of  financial  father 
hood  to  the  Illinois  town. 

The  incident  with  Ed  and  the  red-haired  man  had  been 
his  first  serious  effort  at  anything  like  social  service 
achieved  through  controlling  or  attempting  to  influence 
the  public  mind,  for  his  was  the  type  of  mind  that  runs  to 
the  concrete,  the  actual.  As  he  sat  in  the  ravine  talking 
to  Jake,  and,  later,  coming  home  in  the  boat  under  the 
multitude  of  stars,  he  had  looked  up  from  among  the 
drunken  workmen  and  his  mind  had  seen  a  city  built  for 
a  people,  a  city  independent,  beautiful,  strong  and  free, 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          279 

but  a  glimpse  of  a  red  head  through  a  bar-room  door 
and  a  socialist  trembling  before  a  name  had  dispelled  the 
vision.  After  his  return  from  hearing  the  socialist,  who 
in  his  turn  was  hedged  about  by  complicated  influences, 
and  in  those  November  days  when  he  walked  south 
through  Illinois,  seeing  the  late  glory  of  the  trees  and 
breathing  the  fine  air,  he  laughed  at  himself  for  having 
had  the  vision.  It  was  not  that  the  red-haired  man 
had  sold  him  out,  it  was  not  the  beating  given  him  by 
Ed's  sullen-faced  son  or  the  blows  across  the  face  at 
the  hands  of  his  vigorous  wife — it  was  just  that  at 
bottom  he  did  not  believe  the  people  wanted  reform; 
they  wanted  a  ten  per  cent  raise  in  wages.  The  public 
mind  was  a  thing  too  big,  too  complicated  and  inert 
for  a  vision  or  an  ideal  to  get  at  and  move  deeply. 

And  then,  walking  on  the  road  and  struggling  to  find 
truth  even  within  himself,  Sam  had  to  come  to  some 
thing  else.  At  bottom  he  was  no  leader,  no  reformer. 
He  had  not  wanted  the  free  city  for  a  free  people,  but 
as  a  work  to  be  done  by  his  own  hand.  He  was  Mc- 
Pherson,  the  money  maker,  the  man  who  loved  him 
self.  The  fact,  not  the  sight  of  Jake  hobnobbing  with 
Bill  or  the  timidity  of  the  socialist,  had  blocked  his  way 
to  work  as  a  political  reformer  and  builder. 

Tramping  south  between  the  rows  of  shocked  corn 
he  laughed  at  himself.  "The  experience  with  Ed  and 
Jake  has  done  something  for  me,"  he  thought.  "They 
bullied  me.  I  have  been  a  kind  of  bully  myself  and 
what  has  happened  has  been  good  medicine  for  me/' 

Sam  walked  the  roads  of  Illinois,  Ohio,  New  York, 
and  other  states,  through  hill  country  and  flat  country, 
in  the  snow  drifts  of  winter  and  through  the  storms 
of  spring,  talking  to  people,  asking  their  way  of  life 
and  the  end  toward  which  they  worked.  At  night 
he  dreamed  of  Sue,  of  his  boyhood  struggles  in  Caxton, 
of  Janet  Eberly  sitting  in  her  chair  and  talking  of  writ- 


280          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

ers  of  books,  or,  visualising  the  stock  exchange  or  some 
garish  drinking  place,  he  saw  again  the  faces  of  Crofts, 
Webster,  Morrison  and  Prince  intent  and  eager  as  he 
laid  before  them  some  scheme  of  money  making.  Some 
times  at  night  he  awoke,  seized  with  horror,  seeing 
Colonel  Tom  with  the  revolver  pressed  against  his  head  ; 
and  sitting  in  his  bed,  and  all  through  the  next  day  he 
talked  aloud  to  himself. 

"The  damned  old  coward,"  he  shouted  into  the  dark 
ness  of  his  room  or  into  the  wide  peaceful  prospect  of  the 
countryside. 

The  idea  of  Colonel  Tom  as  a  suicide  seemed  unreal, 
grotesque,  horrible.  It  was  as  though  some  round- 
cheeked,  curly-headed  boy  had  done  the  thing  to  him 
self.  The  man  had  been  so  boyishly,  so  blusteringly 
incompetent,  so  completely  and  absolutely  without  big 
ness  and  purpose. 

"And  yet,"  thought  Sam,  "he  has  found  strength  to 
whip  me,  the  man  of  ability.  He  has  taken  revenge, 
absolute  and  unanswerable,  for  the  slight  I  put  upon  the 
little  play  world  in  which  he  had  been  king." 

In  fancy  Sam  could  see  the  great  paunch  and  the  little 
white  pointed  beard  sticking  up  from  the  floor  in  the 
room  where  the  Colonel  lay  dead,  and  into  his  mind 
came  a  saying,  a  sentence,  the  distorted  remembrance 
of  a  thought  he  had  got  from  a  book  of  Janet's  or  from 
some  talk  he  had  heard,  perhaps  at  his  own  dinner 
table. 

"It  is  horrible  to  see  a  fat  man  with  purple  veins  in 
his  face  lying  dead." 

At  such  times  he  hurried  along  the  road  like  one 
pursued.  People  driving  past  in  buggies  and  seeing  him 
and  hearing  the  stream  of  talk  that  issued  from  his  lips, 
turned  and  watched  him  out  of  sight.  And  Sam,  hurry 
ing  and  seeking  relief  from  the  thoughts  in  his  mind, 
called  to  the  old  commonsense  instincts  within  himself 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          28 1 

as  a  captain  marshals  his  forces  to  withstand  an  attack. 

"I  will  find  work.  I  will  find  work.  I  will  seek 
Truth,"  he  said. 

Sam  avoided  the  larger  towns  or  went  hurriedly 
through  them,  sleeping  night  after  night  at  village  hotels 
or  at  some  hospitable  farmhouse,  and  daily  he  increased 
the  length  of  his  walks,  getting  real  satisfaction  from 
the  aching  of  his  legs  and  from  the  bruising  of  his 
unaccustomed  feet  on  the  hard  road.  Like  St.  Jerome, 
he  had  a  wish  to  beat  upon  his  body  and  subdue  the 
flesh.  In  turn  he  was  blown  upon  by  the  wind,  chilled 
by  the  winter  frost,  wet  by  the  rains,  and  warmed  by  the 
sun.  In  the  spring  he  swam  in  rivers,  lay  on  sheltered 
hillsides  watching  the  cattle  grazing  in  the  fields  and  the 
white  clouds  floating  across  the  sky,  and  constantly  his 
legs  became  harder  and  his  body  more  flat  and  sinewy. 
Once  he  slept  for  a  night  in  a  straw  stack  at  the  edge 
of  a  woods  and  in  the  morning  was  awakened  by  a 
farmer's  dog  licking  his  face. 

Several  times  he  came  up  to  vagabonds,  umbrella 
menders  and  other  roadsters,  and  walked  with  them,  but 
he  found  in  their  society  no  incentive  to  join  in  their 
flights  across  country  on  freight  trains  or  on  the  fronts 
of  passenger  trains.  Those  whom  he  met  and  with 
whom  he  talked  and  walked  did  not  interest  him  greatly. 
They  had  no  end  in  life,  sought  no  ideal  of  usefulness. 
Walking  and  talking  with  them,  the  romance  went  out 
of  their  wandering  life.  They  were  utterly  dull  and 
stupid,  they  were,  almost  without  exception,  strikingly 
unclean,  they  wanted  passionately  to  get  drunk,  and  they 
seemed  to  be  forever  avoiding  life  with  its  problems  and 
responsibilities.  They  always  talked  of  the  big  cities, 
of  "Chi"  and  "Cinci"  and  "Frisco,"  and  were  bent 
upon  getting  to  one  of  these  places.  They  condemned 
the  rich  and  begged  and  stole  from  the  poor,  talked  swag- 
geringly  of  their  personal  courage  and  ran  whimpering 


282          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

and  begging  before  country  constables.  One  of  them,  a 
tall,  leering  youth  in  a  grey  cap,  who  came  up  to  Sam 
one  evening  at  the  edge  of  a  village  in  Indiana,  tried 
to  rob  him.  Full  of  his  new  strength  and  with  the 
thought  of  Ed's  wife  and  the  sullen-faced  son  in  his 
mind,  Sam  sprang  upon  him  and  had  revenge  for  the 
beating  received  in  the  office  of  Ed's  hotel  by  beating 
this  fellow  in  his  turn.  When  the  tall  youth  had  partially 
recovered  from  the  beating  and  had  staggered  to  his 
feet,  he  ran  off  into  the  darkness,  stopping  when  well 
out  of  reach  to  hurl  a  stone  that  splashed  in  the  mud 
of  the  road  at  Sam's  feet. 

Everywhere  Sam  sought  people  who  would  talk  to  him 
of  themselves.  He  had  a  kind  of  faith  that  a  message 
would  come  to  him  out  of  the  mouth  of  some  simple, 
homely  dweller  of  the  villages  or  the  farms.  A  woman, 
with  whom  he  talked  in  the  railroad  station  at  Fort 
Wayne,  Indiana,  interested  him  so  that  he  went  into  a 
train  with  her  and  travelled  all  night  in  the  day  coach, 
listening  to  her  talk  of  her  three  sons,  one  of  whom  had 
weak  lungs  and  had,  with  two  younger  brothers,  taken 
up  government  land  in  the  west.  The  woman  had  been 
with  them  for  some  months,  helping  them  to  get  a 
start. 

"I  was  raised  on  a  farm  and  knew  things  they  could 
not  know,"  she  told  Sam,  raising  her  voice  above  the 
rumble  of  the  train  and  the  snoring  of  fellow  passengers. 

She  had  worked  with  her  sons  in  the  field,  ploughing 
and  planting,  had  driven  a  team  across  country,  carrying 
boards  for  the  building  of  a  house,  and  had  grown  brown 
and  strong  at  the  work. 

"And  Walter  is  getting  well.  His  arms  are  as  brown 
as  my  own  and  he  has  gained  eleven  pounds,"  she  said, 
rolling  up  her  sleeves  and  showing  her  heavy,  muscular 
forearms." 

She  planned  to  take  her  husband,  a  machinist  work- 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  283 

ing  in  a  bicycle  factory  in  Buffalo,  and  her  two  grown 
daughters,  clerks  in  a  drygoods  store,  with  her  and  return 
to  the  new  country,  and  having  a  sense  of  her  hearer's 
interest  in  her  story,  she  talked  of  the  bigness  of  the 
west  and  the  loneliness  of  the  vast,  silent  plains,  saying 
that  they  sometimes  made  her  heart  ache.  Sam  thought 
she  had  in  some  way  achieved  success,  although  he  did 
not  see  how  her  experience  could  serve  as  a  guide  to  him. 

"You  have  got  somewhere.  You  have  got  hold  of 
a  truth/'  he  said,  taking  her  hand  when  he  got  off  the 
train  at  Cleveland,  at  dawn. 

At  another  time,  in  the  late  spring,  when  he  was  tramp 
ing  through  Southern  Ohio,  a  man  drove  up  beside  him, 
and  pulling  in  his  horse,  asked,  "Where  are  you  going?" 
adding  genially,  "I  may  be  able  to  give  you  a  lift." 

Sam  looked  at  him  and  smiled.  Something  in  the 
man's  manner  or  in  his  dress  suggesting  the  man  of 
God,  he  assumed  a  bantering  air. 

"I  am  on  my  way  to  the  New  Jerusalem,"  he  said 
seriously.  "I  am  one  who  seeks  God." 

The  young  minister  picked  up  his  reins  with  a  look 
of  alarm,  but  when  he  saw  a  smile  playing  about  the 
corners  of  Sam's  mouth,  he  turned  the  wheels  of  his 
buggy. 

"Get  in  and  come  along  with  me  and  we  will  talk  of 
the  New  Jerusalem,"  he  said. 

On  the  impulse  Sam  got  into  the  buggy,  and  driving 
along  the  dusty  road,  told  the  essential  parts  of  his  story 
and  of  his  quest  for  an  end  toward  which  he  might 
work. 

"It  would  be  simple  enough  if  I  were  without  money 
and  driven  by  hard  necessity,  but  I  am  not.  I  want 
work,  not  because  it  is  work  and  will  bring  me  bread 
and  butter,  but  because  I  need  to  be  doing  something  that 
will  satisfy  me  when  I  am  done.  I  do  not  want  so 
much  to  serve  men  as  to  serve  myself.  I  want  to  get 


284          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

at  happiness  and  usefulness  as  for  years  I  got  at  money 
making.  There  is  a  right  way  of  life  for  such  a  man 
as  me,  and  I  want  to  find  that  way." 

The  young  minister,  who  was  a  graduate  of  a  Lutheran 
seminary  at  Springfield,  Ohio,  and  had  come  out  of  col 
lege  with  a  very  serious  outlook  on  life,  took  Sam  to  his 
house  and  together  they  sat  talking  half  the  night.  He 
had  a  wife,  a  country  girl  with  a  babe  lying  at  her  breast, 
who  got  supper  for  them,  and  who,  after  supper,  sat  in 
the  shadows  in  a  corner  of  the  living-room  listening  to 
their  talk. 

The  two  men  sat  together.  Sam  smoked  his  pipe  and 
the  minister  poked  at  a  coal  fire  that  burned  in  a  stove. 
They  talked  of  God  and  of  what  the  thought  of  God 
meant  to  men ;  but  the  young  minister  did  not  try  to  give 
Sam  an  answer  to  his  problem;  on  the  contrary,  Sam 
found  him  strikingly  dissatisfied  and  unhappy  in  his  way 
of  life. 

"There  is  no  spirit  of  God  here,"  he  said,  poking 
viciously  at  the  coals  in  the  stove.  "The  people  here 
do  not  want  me  to  talk  to  them  of  God.  They  have  no 
curiosity  about  what  He  wants  of  them  nor  of  why  He 
has  put  them  here.  They  want  me  to  tell  them  of  a  city 
in  the  sky,  a  kind  of  glorified  Dayton,  Ohio,  to  which 
they  can  go  when  they  have  finished  this  life  of  work 
and  of  putting  money  in  the  savings  bank." 

For  several  days  Sam  stayed  with  the  clergyman, 
driving  about  the  country  with  him  and  talking  of  God. 
In  the  evening  they  sat  in  the  house,  continuing  their 
talks,  and  on  Sunday  Sam  went  to  hear  the  man  preach 
in  his  church. 

The  sermon  was  a  disappointment  to  Sam.  Although 
his  host  had  talked  vigorously  and  well  in  private,  his 
public  address  was  stilted  and  unnatural. 

"The  man,"  thought  Sam,  "has  no  feeling  for  public 
address  and  is  not  treating  his  people  well  in  not  giving 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  285 

them,  without  reservation,  the  ideas  he  has  expounded 
to  me  in  his  house."  He  decided  there  was  something 
to  be  said  for  the  people  who  sat  patiently  listening 
week  after  week  and  who  gave  the  man  the  means  of  a 
living  for  so  iame  an  effort. 

One  evening  when  Sam  had  been  with  them  for  a 
week  the  young  wife  came  to  him  as  he  stood  on  the 
little  porch  before  the  house. 

."I  wish  you  would  go  away,"  she  said,  standing  with 
her  babe  in  her  arms  and  looking  at  the  porch  floor. 
"You  stir  him  up  and  make  him  dissatisfied." 

Sam  stepped  off  the  porch  and  hurried  off  up  the  road 
into  the  darkness.  There  had  been  tears  in  the  wife's 
eyes. 

In  June  he  went  with  a  threshing  crew,  working 
among  labourers  and  eating  with  them  in  the  fields  or 
about  the  crowded  tables  of  farmhouses  where  they 
stopped  to  thresh.  Each  day  Sam  and  the  men  with 
him  worked  in  a  new  place  and  had  as  helpers  the 
farmer  for  whom  they  threshed  and  several  of  his  neigh 
bours.  The  farmers  worked  at  a  killing  pace  and  the 
men  of  the  threshing  crew  were  expected  to  keep  abreast 
of  each  new  lot  of  them  day  after  day.  At  night  the 
threshermen,  too  weary  for  talk,  crept  into  the  loft  of 
a  barn,  slept  until  daylight  and  then  began  another  day 
of  heartbreaking  toil.  On  Sunday  morning  they  went 
for  a  swim  in  some  creek  and  in  the  afternoon  sat  in  a 
barn  or  under  the  trees  of  an  orchard  sleeping  or  in 
dulging  in  detached,  fragmentary  bits  of  talk,  talk  that 
never  rose  above  a  low,  wearisome  level.  For  hours 
they  would  try  to  settle  a  dispute  as  to  whether  a  horse 
they  had  seen  at  some  farm  during  the  week  had  three, 
or  four,  white  feet,  and  one  man  in  the  crew  never  talked 
at  all,  sitting  on  his  heels  through  the  long  Sunday  after 
noons  and  whittling  at  a  stick  with  his  pocket  knife. 

The  threshing  outfit  with  which   Sam  worked  was 


286          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

owned  by  a  man  named  Joe,  who  was  in  debt  for  it 
to  the  maker  and  who,  after  working  with  the  men  all 
day,  drove  about  the  country  half  the  night  making  deals 
with  farmers  for  other  days  of  threshing.  Sam  thought 
that  he  looked  constantly  on  the  point  of  collapse  through 
overwork  and  worry,  and  one  of  the  men,  who  had  been 
with  Joe  through  several  seasons,  told  Sam  that  at  the 
end  of  the  season  their  employer  did  not  have  enough 
money  left  from  his  season  of  work  to  pay  the  interest 
on  the  debt  for  his  machines  and  that  he  continually 
took  jobs  for  less  than  the  cost  of  doing  them. 

"One  has  to  keep  going,"  said  Joe,  when  one  day  Sam 
began  talking  to  him  on  the  matter. 

When  told  to  keep  Sam's  wage  until  the  end  of  the 
season  he  looked  relieved  and  at  the  end  of  the  season 
came  to  Sam,  looking  more  worried  and  said  that  he 
had  no  money." 

"I  will  give  you  a  note  bearing  good  interest  if  you 
can  let  me  have  a  little  time/'  he  said. 

Sam  took  the  note  and  looked  at  the  pale,  drawn  face 
peering  out  of  him  from  the  shadows  at  the  back  of  the 
barn. 

"Why  do  you  not  drop  the  whole  thing  and  begin 
working  for  some  one  else?"  he  asked. 

Joe   looked   indignant. 

"A  man  wants  independence,"  he  said. 

When  Sam  got  again  upon  the  road  he  stopped  at  a 
little  bridge  over  a  stream,  and  tearing  up  Joe's  note 
watched  the  torn  pieces  of  it  float  away  upon  the  brown 
water. 


CHAPTER  III 

THROUGH  the  summer  and  early  fall  Sam  continued 
his  wanderings.  The  days  on  which  something  happened 
or  on  which  something  outside  himself  interested  or  at 
tracted  him  were  special  days,  giving  him  food  for  hours 
of  thought,  but  for  the  most  part  he  walked  on  and  on 
for  weeks,  sunk  in  a  kind  of  healing  lethargy  of  physical 
fatigue.  Always  he  tried  to  get  at  people  who  came  into 
his  way  and  to  discover  something  of  their  way  of  life 
and  the  end  toward  which  they  worked,  and  many  an 
open-mouthed,  staring  man  and  woman  he  left  behind 
him  on  the  road  and  on  the  sidewalks  of  the  villages. 
He  had  one  principle  of  action;  whenever  an  idea  came 
into  his  mind  he  did  not  hesitate,  but  began  trying  at 
once  the  practicability  of  living  by  following  the  idea, 
and  although  the  practice  brought  him  to  no  end  and 
only  seemed  to  multiply  the  difficulties  of  the  problem 
he  was  striving  to  work  out,  it  brought  him  many  strange 
experiences. 

At  one  time  he  was  for  several  days  a  bartender  in  a 
saloon  in  a  town  in  eastern  Ohio.  The  saloon  was  in  a 
small  wooden  building  facing  a  railroad  track  and  Sam 
had  gone  in  there  with  a  labourer  met  on  the  sidewalk. 
It  was  a  stormy  night  in  September  at  the  end  of  his 
first  year  of  wandering  and  while  he  stood  by  a  roaring 
coal  stove,  after  buying  drinks  for  the  labourer  and 
cigars  for  himself,  several  men  came  in  and  stood  by  the 
bar  drinking  together.  As  they  drank  they  became  more 
and  more  friendly,  slapping  each  other  on  the  back,  sing 
ing  songs  and  boasting.  One  of  them  got  out  upon  the 

287 


288          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

floor  and  danced  a  jig.  The  proprietor,  a  round-faced 
man  with  one  dead  eye,  who  had  himself  been  drinking 
freely,  put  a  bottle  upon  the  bar  and  coming  up  to  Sam, 
began  complaining  that  he  had  no  bartender  and  had 
to  work  long  hours. 

"Drink  what  you  want,  boys,  and  then  I'll  tell  you 
what  you  owe,"  he  said  to  the  men  standing  along  the 
bar. 

Watching  the  men  who  drank  and  played  like  school 
boys  about  the  room,  and  looking  at  the  bottle  sitting  on 
the  bar,  the  contents  of  which  had  for  the  moment  taken 
the  sombre  dulness  out  of  the  lives  of  the  workmen, 
Sam  said  to  himself,  "I  will  take  up  this  trade.  It  may 
appeal  to  me.  At  least  I  shall  be  selling  forgetfulness 
and  not  be  wasting  my  life  with  this  tramping  on  the 
road  and  thinking." 

The  saloon  in  which  he  worked  was  a  profitable  one 
and  although  in  an  obscure  place  had  made  its  proprietor 
what  is  called  "well  fixed."  It  had  a  side  door  opening 
into  an  alley  and  one  went  up  this  alley  to  the  main 
street  of  the  town.  The  front  door  looking  upon  the 
railroad  tracks  was  but  little  used,  perhaps  at  the  noon 
hour  two  or  three  young  men  from  the  freight  depot 
down  the  tracks  would  come  in  by  it  and  stand  about 
drinking  beer,  but  the  trade  that  came  down  the  alley 
and  in  at  the  side  door  was  prodigious.  All  day  long 
men  hurried  in  at  this  door,  took  drinks  and  hurried  out 
again,  looking  up  the  alley  and  running  quickly  when 
they  found  the  way  clear.  These  men  all  drank  whiskey, 
and  when  Sam  had  worked  for  a  few  days  in  the  place 
he  once  made  the  mistake  of  reaching  for  the  bottle 
when  he  heard  the  door  open. 

"Let  them  ask  for  it,"  said  the  proprietor  gruffly. 
"Do  you  want  to  insult  a  man?" 

On  Saturday  the  place  was  filled  all  day  with  beer- 
drinking  farmers,  and  at  odd  hours  on  other  days  men 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          289 

came  in,  whimpering  and  begging  drinks.  When  alone 
in  the  place,  Sam  looked  at  the  trembling  fingers  of  these 
men  and  put  the  bottle  before  them,  saying,  "Drink  all 
you  want  of  the  stuff." 

When  the  proprietor  was  in  the  men  who  begged 
drinks  stood  a  moment  by  the  stove  and  then  went  out 
thrusting  their  hands  into  their  coat  pockets  and  looking 
at  the  floor. 

"Bar  flies,"  the  proprietor  explained  laconically. 

The  whiskey  was  horrible.  The  proprietor  mixed  it 
himself  and  put  it  into  stone  jars  that  stood  under  the 
bar,  pouring  it  out  of  these  into  bottles  as  they  became 
empty.  He  kept  on  display  in  glass  cases  bottles  of 
well  known  brands  of  whiskey,  but  when  a  man  came 
in  and  asked  for  one  of  these  brands  Sam  handed  him 
a  bottle  bearing  that  label  from  beneath  the  bar,  a  bottle 
previously  filled  by  Al  from  the  jugs  of  his  own  mix 
ture.  As  Al  sold  no  mixed  drinks  Sam  was  compelled 
to  know  nothing  the  bartender's  art  and  stood  all  day 
handing  out  AFs  poisonous  stuff  and  the  foaming  glasses 
of  beer  the  workingmen  drank  in  the  evening. 

Of  the  men  coming  in  at  the  side  door,  a  shoe  mer 
chant,  a  grocer,  the  proprietor  of  a  restaurant  and  a 
telegraph  operator  interested  Sam  most.  Several  times 
each  day  these  men  would  appear,  glance  back  over  their 
shoulders  at  the  door,  and  then  turning  to  the  bar  would 
look  at  Sam  apologetically. 

"Give  me  a  little  out  of  the  bottle,  I  have  a  bad 
cold,"  they  would  say,  as  though  repeating  a  formula. 

At  the  end  of  the  week  Sam  was  on  the  road  again. 
The  rather  bizarre  notion  that  by  staying  there  he  would 
be  selling  forgetfulness  of  life's  unhappiness  had  been 
dispelled  during  his  first  day's  duty,  and  his  curiosity 
concerning  the  customers  was  his  undoing.  As  the  men 
came  in  at  the  side  door  and  stood  before  him  Sam 
leaned  over  the  bar  and  asked  them  why  they  drank. 


290          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

Some  of  the  men  laughed,  some  swore  at  him  and  the 
telegraph  operator  reported  the  matter  to  Al,  calling 
Sam's  question  an  impertinence. 

"You  fool,  don't  you  know  better  than  to  be  throw 
ing  stones  at  the  bar?"  Al  roared,  and  with  an  oath 
discharged  him. 


CHAPTER  IV 

ONE  fine  warm  morning  in  the  fall  Sam  was  sitting 
in  a  little  park  in  the  centre  of  a  Pennsylvania  manufac 
turing  town  watching  men  and  women  going  through  the 
quiet  streets  to  the  factories  and  striving  to  overcome  a 
feeling  of  depression  aroused  by  an  experience  of  the  eve 
ning  before.  He  had  come  into  town  over  a  poorly  made 
clay  road  running  through  barren  hills,  and,  depressed 
and  weary,  had  stood  on  the  shores  of  a  river,  swollen 
by  the  early  fall  rains,  that  flowed  along  the  edges  of 
the  town. 

Before  him  in  the  distance  he  had  looked  into  the 
windows  of  a  huge  factory,  the  black  smoke  from  which 
added  to  the  gloom  of  the  scene  that  lay  before  him. 
Through  the  windows  of  the  factory,  dimly  seen,  work 
ers  ran  here  and  there,  appearing  and  disappearing,  the 
glare  of  the  furnace  fire  lighting  now  one,  now  another 
of  them,  sharply.  At  his  feet  the  tumbling  waters  that 
rolled  and  pitched  over  a  little  dam  fascinated  him. 
Looking  closely  at  the  racing  waters  his  head,  light  from 
physical  weariness,  reeled,  and  in  fear  of  falling  he  had 
been  compelled  to  grip  firmly  the  small  tree  against  which 
he  leaned.  In  the  back  yard  of  a  house  across  the  stream 
from  Sam  and  facing  the  factory  four  guinea  hens  sat 
on  a  board  fence,  their  weird,  plaintive  cries  making  a 
peculiarly  fitting  accompaniment  to  the  scene  that  lay 
before  him,  and  in  the  yard  itself  two  bedraggled  fowls 
fought  each  other.  Again  and  again  they  sprang  into 
the  fray,  striking  out  with  bills  and  spurs.  Becoming 
exhausted,  they  fell  to  picking  and  scratching  among 
the  rubbish  in  the  yard,  and  when  they  had  a  little  recov- 

291 


292         WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

ered  renewed  the  struggle.  For  an  hour  Sam  had  looked 
at  the  scene,  letting  his  eyes  wander  from  the  river  to 
the  grey  sky  and  to  the  factory  belching  forth  its  black 
smoke.  He  had  thought  that  the  two  feebly  struggling 
fowls,  immersed  in  their  pointless  struggle  in  the  midst 
of  such  mighty  force,  epitomised  much  of  man's  struggle 
in  the  world,  and,  turning,  had  gone  along  the  sidewalks 
and  to  the  village  hotel,  feeling  old  and  tired.  Now  on 
the  bench  in  the  little  park,  with  the  early  morning  sun 
shining  down  through  the  glistening  rain  drops  cling 
ing  to  the  red  leaves  of  the  trees,  he  began  to  lose  the 
sense  of  depression  that  had  clung  to  him  through  the 
night. 

A  young  man  who  walked  in  the  park  saw  him 
idly  watching  the  hurrying  workers,  and  stopped  to  sit 
beside  him. 

"On  the  road,  brother?"  he  asked. 

Sam  shook  his  head,  and  the  other  began  talking. 

"Fools  and  slaves,"  he  said  earnestly,  pointing  to  the 
men  and  women  passing  on-  the  sidewalk.  "See  them 
going  like  beasts  to  their  bondage?  What  do  they  get 
for  it?  What  kind  of  lives  do  they  lead?  The  lives  of 
dogs." 

He  looked  at  Sam  for  approval  of  the  sentiment  he 
had  voiced. 

"We  are  all  fools  and  slaves,"  said  Sam,  stoutly. 

Jumping  to  his  feet  the  young  man  began  waving  his 
arms  about. 

"There,  you  talk  sense,"  he  cried.  "Welcome  to  our 
town,  stranger.  We  have  no  thinkers  here.  The  work 
ers  are  like  dogs.  There  is  no  solidarity  among  them. 
Come  and  have  breakfast  with  me." 

In  the  restaurant  the  young  man  began  talking  of  him 
self.  He  was  a  graduate  of  the  University  of  Pennsyl 
vania.  His  father  had  died  while  he  was  yet  in  school 
and  had  left  him  a  modest  fortune,  upon  the  income  of 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          293 

which  he  lived  with  his  mother.  He  did  no  work  and 
was  enormously  proud  of  the  fact. 

"I  refuse  to  work!  I  scorn  it!"  he  declared,  shaking  a 
breakfast  roll  in  the  air. 

Since  leaving  school  he  had  devoted  himself  to  the 
cause  of  the  socialist  party  in  his  native  town,  and 
boasted  of  the  leadership  he  had  already  achieved.  His 
mother,  he  declared,  was  disturbed  and  worried  because 
of  his  connection  with  the  movement. 

"She  wants  me  to  be  respectable,"  he  said  sadly,  and 
added,  "What's  the  use  trying  to  explain  to  a  woman? 
I  can't  get  her  to  see  the  difference  between  a  socialist 
and  a  direct-action  anarchist  and  I've  given  up  trying. 
She  expects  me  to  end  by  blowing  somebody  up  with 
dynamite  or  by  getting  into  jail  for  throwing  bricks  at 
the  borough  police." 

He  talked  of  a  strike  going  on  among  some  girl  em 
ployes  of  a  Jewish  shirtwaist  factory  in  the  town,  and 
Sam,  immediately  interested,  began  asking  questions, 
and  after  breakfast  went  with  his  new  acquaintance  to 
the  scene  of  the  strike. 

The  shirtwaist  factory  was  located  in  a  loft  above  a 
grocery  store,  and  on  the  sidewalk  in  front  of  the  store 
three  girl  pickets  were  walking  up  and  down.  A  flashily 
dressed  Hebrew,  with  a  cigar  in  his  mouth  and  his  hands 
in  his  trousers  pockets,  stood  in  the  stairway  leading  to 
the  loft  and  looked  closely  at  the  young  socialist  and 
Sam.  From  his  lips  came  a  stream  of  vile  words  which 
he  pretended  to  be  addressing  to  the  empty  air.  When 
Sam  walked  towards  him  he  turned  and  ran  up  the  stairs, 
shouting  oaths  over  his  shoulder. 

Sam  joined  the  three  girls,  and  began  talking  to  them, 
walking  up  and  down  with  them  before  the  grocery 
store. 

"What  are  you  doing  to  win?"  he  asked  when  they 
had  told  him  of  their  grievances. 


294          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

"We  do  what  we  can!"  said  a  Jewish  girl  with  broad 
hips,  great  motherly  breasts,  and  fine,  soft,  brown  eyes, 
who  appeared  to  be  a  leader  and  spokesman  among 
the  strikers.  "We  walk  up  and  down  here  and  try 
to  get  a  word  with  the  strikebreakers  the  boss  has 
brought  in  from  other  towns,  when  they  go  in  and 
come  out." 

Frank,  the  University  man,  spoke  up.  "We  are  put 
ting  up  stickers  everywhere,"  he  said.  "I  myself  have 
put  up  hundreds  of  them." 

He  took  from  his  coat  pocket  a  printed  slip,  gummed 
on  one  side,  and  told  Sam  that  he  had  been  putting  them 
on  walls  and  telegraph  poles  about  town.  The  thing  was 
vilely  written.  "Down  with  the  dirty  scabs"  was  the 
heading  in  bold,  black  letters  across  the  top. 

Sam  was  shocked  at  the  vileness  of  the  caption  and  at 
the  crude  brutality  of  the  text  printed  on  the  slip. 

"Do  you  call  women  workers  names  like  that?"  he 
asked. 

"They  have  taken  our  work  from  us,"  the  Jewish  girl 
answered  simply  and  began  again,  telling  the  story  of 
her  sister  strikers  and  of  what  the  low  wage  had  meant 
to  them  and  to  their  families.  "To  me  it  does  not  so 
much  matter ;  I  have  a  brother  who  works  in  a  clothing 
store  and  he  can  support  me,  but  many  of  the  women  in 
our  union  have  only  their  wage  here  with  which  to  feed 
their  families." 

Sam's  mind  began  working  on  the  problem. 

"Here,"  he  declared,  "is  something  definite  to  do,  a 
battle  in  which  I  will  pit  myself  against  this  employer 
for  the  sake  of  these  women." 

He  put  away  from  him  his  experience  in  the  Illinois 
town,  telling  himself  that  the  young  woman  walking  be 
side  him  would  have  a  sense  of  honour  unknown  to  the 
red-haired  young  workman  who  had  sold  him  out  to 
Bill  and  Ed. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          295 

"I  failed  with  my  money,"  he  thought,  "now  I  will 
try  to  help  these  girls  with  my  energy." 

Turning  to  the  Jewish  girl  he  made  a  quick  decision. 

"I  will  help  you  get  your  places  back,"  he  said. 

Leaving  the  girls  he  went  across  the  street  to  a  barber 
shop  where  he  could  watch  the  entrance  to  the  factory. 
He  wanted  to  think  out  a  method  of  procedure  and 
wanted  also  to  look  at  the  girl  strikebreakers  as  they 
came  to  work.  After  a  time  several  girls  came  along 
the  street  and  turned  in  at  the  stairway.  The  flashily 
dressed  Hebrew  with  the  cigar  still  in  his  mouth  was 
again  by  the  stairway  entrance.  The  three  pickets  run 
ning  forward  accosted  the  file  of  girls  going  up  the  stairs, 
one  of  whom,  a  young  American  girl  with  yellow  hair, 
turned  and  shouted  something  over  her  shoulder.  The 
man  called  Frank  shouted  back  and  the  Hebrew  took  the 
cigar  out  of  his  mouth  and  laughed  heartily.  Sam  filled 
and  lighted  his  pipe,  a  dozen  plans  for  helping  the  strik 
ing  girls  running  through  his  mind. 

During  the  morning  he  went  into  the  grocery  store  on 
the  corner,  a  saloon  in  the  neighbourhood,  and  returned 
to  the  barber  shop  talking  to  men  of  the  strike.  He  ate 
his  lunch  alone,  still  thinking  of  the  three  girls  patiently 
walking  up  and  down  before  the  stairway.  Their  cease 
less  walking  seemed  to  him  a  useless  waste  of  energy. 

"They  should  be  doing  something  more  definite,"  he 
thought. 

After  lunch  he  joined  the  soft-eyed  Jewish  girl  and 
together  they  walked  along  the  street  talking  of  the 
strike. 

"You  cannot  win  this  strike  by  just  calling  nasty 
names,"  he  said.  "I  do  not  like  that  'dirty  scab'  sticker 
Frank  had  in  his  pocket.  It  cannot  help  you  and  only 
antagonises  the  girls  who  have  taken  your  places.  Here 
in  this  part  of  town  the  people  want  to  see  you  win.  I 
have  talked  to  the  men  who  come  into  the  saloon  and  the 


296          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

barber  shop  across  the  street  and  you  already  have  their 
sympathy.  You  want  to  get  the  sympathy  of  the  girls 
who  have  taken  your  places.  Calling  them  dirty  scabs 
only  makes  martyrs  of  them.  Did  the  yellow-haired  girl 
call  you  a  name  this  morning  ?" 

The  Jewish  girl  looked  at  Sam  and  laughed  bitterly. 

"Rather;  she  called  me  a  loud-mouthed  street  walker." 

They  continued  their  walk  along  the  street,  across  the 
railroad  track  and  a  bridge,  and  into  a  quiet  residence 
street.  Carriages  stood  at  the  curb  before  the  houses, 
and  pointing  to  these  and  to  the  well-kept  houses  Sam 
said,  "Men  have  bought  these  things  for  their  women." 

A  shadow  fell  across  the  girl's  face. 

"I  suppose  all  of  us  want  what  these  women  have," 
she  answered.  "We  do  not  really  want  to  fight  and  to 
stand  on  our  own  feet,  not  when  we  know  the  world. 
What  a  woman  really  wants  is  a  man,"  she  added  shortly. 

Sam  began  talking  and  told  her  of  a  plan  that  had 
come  into  his  mind.  He  had  remembered  how  Jack 
Prince  and  Morrison  used  to  talk  about  the  appeal  of 
the  direct  personal  letter  and  how  effectively  it  was 
used  by  mail  order  houses. 

"We  will  have  a  mail  order  strike  here/'  he  said  and 
went  on  to  lay  before  her  the  details  of  his  plan.  He 
proposed  that  she,  Frank,  and  some  others  of  the  strik 
ing  girls,  should  go  about  town  getting  the  names  and 
the  mail  addresses  of  the  girl  strikebreakers. 

"Get  also  the  names  of  the  keepers  of  the  board 
ing  houses  at  which  these  girls  live  and  the  names  of  the 
men  and  women  who  live  in  the  same  houses,"  he  sug 
gested.  "Then  you  get  the  striking  girls  and  women  to 
gether  and  have  them  tell  me  their  stories.  We  will  write 
letters  day  after  day  to  the  girl  strikebreakers,  to  the 
women  who  keep  the  boarding  houses,  and  to  the  people 
who  live  in  the  houses  and  sit  at  table  with  them.  We 
won't  call  names.  We  will  tell  the  story  of  what  being 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          297 

beaten  in  this  fight  means  to  the  women  in  your  union, 
tell  it  simply  and  truthfully  as  you  told  it  to  me  this 
morning/' 

"It  will  cost  such  a  lot,"  said  the  Jewish  girl,  shaking 
her  head. 

Sam  took  a  roll  of  bills  from  his  pocket  and  showed  it 
to  her. 

"I  will  pay,"  he  said. 

"Why?"  she  asked,  looking  at  him  sharply. 

"Because  I  am  a  man  wanting  work  just  as  you  want 
work,"  he  replied,  and  then  went  on  hurriedly,  "It  is  a 
long  story.  I  am  a  rich  man  wandering  about  the  world 
seeking  Truth.  I  will  not  want  that  known.  Take  me 
for  granted.  You  won't  be  sorry." 

Within  an  hour  he  had  engaged  a  large  room,  paying 
a  month's  rent  in  advance,  and  into  the  room  chairs  and 
table  and  typewriters  had  been  brought.  He  put  an  ad 
vertisement  in  the  evening  paper  for  girl  stenographers, 
and  a  printer,  hurried  by  a  promise  of  extra  pay,  ran  out 
for  him  several  thousand  letter  heads  across  the  top  of 
which  in  bold,  black  type  ran  the  words,  "The  Girl 
Strikers." 

That  night  Sam  held,  in  the  room  he  had  engaged,  a 
meeting  of  the  girl  strikers,  explaining  to  them  his  plan 
and  offering  to  pay  all  expenses  of  the  fight  he  proposed 
to  make  for  them.  They  clapped  their  hands  and  shouted 
approvingly,  and  Sam  began  laying  out  his  campaign. 

One  of  the  girls  he  told  off  to  stand  in  front  of  the 
factory  morning  and  evening. 

"I  will  have  other  help  for  you  there,"  he  said.  "Be 
fore  you  go  home  to-night  there  will  be  a  printer  here 
with  a  bundle  of  pamphlets  I  am  having  printed  for  you." 

Advised  by  the  soft-eyed  Jewish  girl,  he  told  off 
others  to  get  additional  names  for  the  mailing  list  he 
wanted,  getting  many  important  ones  from  girls  in  the 
room.  Six  of  the  girls  he  asked  to  come  in  the  morning 


298          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

to  help  him  with  addressing  and  mailing  letters.  The 
Jewish  girl  he  told  to  take  charge  of  the  girls  at  work 
in  the  room — on  the  morrow  to  become  also  an  office — 
and  to  superintend  getting  the  names. 

Frank  rose  at  the  back  of  the  room. 

"Who  are  you  anyway?"  he  asked. 

"A  man  with  money  and  the  ability  to  win  this  strike/' 
Sam  told  him. 

"What  are  you  doing  it  for?"  demanded  Frank. 

The  Jewish  girl  sprang  to  her  feet. 

"Because  he  believes  in  these  women  and  wants  to 
help,"  she  explained. 

"Rot,"  said  Frank,  going  out  at  the  door. 

It  was  snowing  when  the  meeting  ended,  and  Sam 
and  the  Jewish  girl  finished  their  talk  in  the  hallway 
leading  to  her  room. 

"I  don't  know  what  Harrigan,  the  union  leader  from 
Pittsburgh,  will  say  to  this,"  she  told  him.  "He  ap 
pointed  Frank  to  lead  and  direct  the  strike  here.  He 
doesn't  like  interference  and  he  may  not  like  your  plan. 
But  we  working  women  need  men,  men  like  you  who  can 
plan  and  do  things.  There  are  too  many  men  living  on 
us.  We  need  men  who  will  work  for  all  of  us  as  the 
men  work  for  the  women  in  the  carriages  and  automo 
biles."  She  laughed  and  put  out  a  hand  to  him.  "See 
what  you  have  got  yourself  into?  I  want  you  to  be  a 
husband  to  our  entire  union." 

The  next  morning  four  girl  stenographers  went  to 
work  in  Sam's  strike  headquarters  and  he  wrote  his  first 
strike  letter,  a  letter  telling  the  story  of  a  striking  girl 
named  Hadaway,  whose  young  brother  was  sick  with 
tuberculosis.  Sam  did  not  put  any  flourishes  in  the  letter ; 
he  felt  that  he  did  not  need  to.  He  thought  that  with 
twenty  or  thirty  such  letters,  each  telling  briefly  and 
truthfully  the  story  of  one  of  the  striking  girls,  he  should 
be  able  to  show  one  American  town  how  its  other  half 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          299 

lived.  He  gave  the  letter  to  the  four  girl  stenographers 
with  the  mailing  list  he  already  had  and  started  them 
writing  it  to  each  of  the  names. 

At  eight  o'clock  a  man  came  in  to  install  a  telephone 
and  girl  strikers  began  bringing  in  new  names  for  the 
mailing  list.  At  nine  o'clock  three  more  stenographers 
appeared  and  were  put  to  work,  and  girls  who  had  been 
in  began  sending  more  names  over  the  'phone.  The 
Jewish  girl  walked  up  and  down,  giving  orders,  making 
suggestions.  From  time  to  time  she  ran  to  Sam's  desk 
and  suggested  other  sources  of  names  for  the  mailing 
list.  Sam  thought  that  if  the  other  working  girls  were 
timid  and  embarrassed  before  him  this  one  was  not. 
She  was  like  a  general  on  the  field  of  battle.  Her  soft 
brown  eyes  glowed,  her  mind  worked  rapidly  and  her 
voice  had  a  ring  in  it.  At  her  suggestion  Sam  gave  the 
girls  at  the  typewriters  lists  bearing  the  names  of  town 
officials,  bankers  and  prominent  business  men,  and  the 
wives  of  all  these,  also  presidents  of  various  women's 
clubs,  society  women,  and  charitable  organisations.  She 
called  reporters  from  the  town's  two  daily  papers  and 
had  them  interview  Sam,  and  at  her  suggestion  he  gave 
them  copies  of  the  Hadaway  girl  letter  to  print. 

"Print  it,"  he  said,  "and  if  you  cannot  use  it  as  news, 
make  it  an  advertisement  and  bring  the  bill  to  me." 

At  eleven  o'clock  Frank  came  into  the  room  bringing 
a  tall  Irishman,  with  sunken  cheeks,  black,  unclean  teeth, 
and  an  overcoat  too  small  for  him.  Leaving  him  stand 
ing  by  the  door,  Frank  walked  across  the  room  to  Sam. 

"Come  to  lunch  with  us,"  he  said.  He  jerked  his 
thumb  over  his  shoulder  toward  the  tall  Irishman.  "I 
picked  him  up,"  he  said.  "Best  brain  that's  been  in  town 
for  years.  He's  a  wonder.  Used  to  be  a  Catholic  priest. 
He  doesn't  believe  in  God  or  love  or  anything.  Come  on 
out  and  hear  him  talk.  He's  great." 

Sam  shook  his  head. 


300          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

"I  am  too  busy.  There  is  work  to  be  done  here.  We 
are  going  to  win  this  strike." 

Frank  looked  at  him  doubtfully  and  then  about  the 
room  at  the  busy  girls. 

"I  don't  know  what  Harrigan  will  think  of  all  this," 
he  said.  "He  doesn't  like  interferences.  I  never  do 
anything  without  writing  him.  I  wrote  and  told  him 
what  you  were  doing  here.  I  had  to,  you  know.  I'm 
responsible  to  headquarters." 

In  the  afternoon  the  Hebrew  owner  of  the  shirtwaist 
factory  came  in  to  strike  headquarters  and,  walking 
through  the  room  took  off  his  hat  and  sat  down  by 
Sam's  desk. 

"What  do  you  want  here  ?"  he  asked.  "The  newspaper 
boys  told  me  of  what  you  had  planned  to  do.  What's 
your  game?" 

"I  want  to  whip  you,"  Sam  answered  quietly,  "to 
whip  you  good.  You  might  as  well  get  into  line.  You 
are  going  to  lose  this  strike." 

"I'm  only  one,"  said  the  Hebrew.  "There  is  an  asso 
ciation  of  us  manufacturers  of  shirtwaists.  We  are  all 
in  this.  We  all  have  a  strike  on  our  hands.  What  will 
you  gain  if  you  do  beat  me  here?  I'm  only  a  little  fel 
low  after  all." 

Sam  laughed  and  picking  up  his  pen  began  writing. 

"You  are  unlucky,"  he  said.  "I  just  happened  to  take 
hold  here.  When  I  have  you  beaten  I  will  go  on  and  beat 
the  others.  There  is  more  money  back  of  me  than  back 
of  you  all  and  I  am  going  to  beat  every  one  of  you." 

The  next  morning  a  crowd  stood  before  the  stairway 
leading  to  the  factory  when  the  strikebreaking  girls  came 
to  work.  The  letters  and  the  newspaper  interview  had 
been  effective  and  more  than  half  the  strikebreakers  did 
not  appear.  The  others  hurried  along  the  street  and 
turned  in  at  the  stairway  without  looking  at  the  crowd. 
The  girl,  told  off  by  Sam,  stood  on  the  sidewalk  pass- 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          301 

ing  out  pamphlets  to  the  strikebreakers.  The  pamphlets 
were  headed,  'The  Story  of  Ten  Girls,"  and  told  briefly 
and  pointedly  the  stories  of  ten  striking  girls  and  what 
the  loss  of  the  strike  meant  to  them  and  to  their  families. 

After  a  while  there  drove  up  two  carriages  and  a 
large  automobile,  and  out  of  the  automobile  climbed  a 
well-dressed  woman  who  took  a  bundle  of  the  pamphlets 
from  the  girl  picket  and  began  passing  them  about  among 
the  people.  Two  policemen  who  stood  in  front  of  the 
crowd  took  off  their  helmets  and  accompanied  her.  The 
crowd  cheered.  Frank  came  hurrying  across  the  street 
to  where  Sam  stood  in  front  of  the  barber  shop  and 
slapped  him  on  the  back. 

"You're  a  wonder,"  he  said. 

Sam  hurried  back  to  the  room  and  prepared  the  sec 
ond  letter  for  the  mailing  list.  Two  more  stenographers 
had  come  to  work.  He  had  to  send  out  for  more  ma 
chines.  A  reporter  for  the  town's  evening  paper  ran 
up  the  stairway. 

"Who  are  you?"  he  asked.  "The  town  wants  to 
know." 

From  his  pocket  he  took  a  telegram  from  a  Pittsburgh 
daily. 

"What  about  mail-order  strike  plan?  Give  name  and 
story  new  strike  leader  there." 

At  ten  o'clock  Frank  returned. 

"There's  a  wire  from  Harrigan,"  he  said.  "He's 
coming  here.  He  wants  a  mass  meeting  of  the  girls  for 
to-night.  I've  got  to  get  them  together.  We'll  meet 
here  in  this  room." 

In  the  room  the  work  went  on.  The  list  of  names 
for  the  mailing  had  doubled.  The  picket  at  the  shirt 
waist  factory  reported  that  three  more  of  the  strike 
breakers  had  left  the  plant.  The  Jewish  girl  was  excited. 
She  went  hurrying  about  the  room,  her  eyes  glowing. 

"It's  great,"  she  said.     "The  plan  is  working.     The 


302          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

whole  town  is  aroused  and  for  us.  We'll  win  in  another 
twenty-four  hours." 

And  then  at  seven  o'clock  that  night  Harrigan  came 
into  the  room  where  Sam  sat  with  the  assembled  girls, 
bolting  the  door  behind  him.  He  was  a  short,  strongly 
built  man  with  blue  eyes  and  red  hair.  He  walked  about 
the  room  in  silence,  followed  by  Frank.  Suddenly  he 
stopped  and,  picking  up  one  of  the  typewriting  machines 
rented  by  Sam  for  the  letter  writing,  raised  it  above 
his  head  and  sent  it  smashing  to  the  floor. 

"A  hell  of  a  strike  leader,"  he  roared.  "Look  at  this. 
Scab  machines! 

"Scab  stenographers !"  he  said  through  his  teeth.  "Scab 
printing!  Scab  everything!" 

Picking  up  a  bundle  of  the  letterheads,  he  tore  them 
across,  and  walking  to  the  front  of  the  room,  shook  his 
fist  before  Sam's  face. 

"Scab  leader!"  he  shouted,  turning  and  facing  the 
girls. 

The  soft-eyed  Jewish  girl  sprang  to  her  feet 

"He's  winning  for  us,"  she  said. 

Harrigan  walked  toward  her  threateningly. 

"Better  lose  than  win  a  scab  victory,"  he  bellowed. 

"Who  are  you  anyway  ?  What  grafter  sent  you  here  ?" 
he  demanded,  turning  to  Sam. 

He  launched  into  a  speech.  "I  have  been  watching 
this  fellow,  I  know  him.  He  has  a  scheme  to  break  down 
the  union  and  is  being  paid  by  the  capitalists." 

Sam  waited  to  hear  no  more.  Getting  up  he  pulled  on 
his  canvas  jacket  and  started  for  the  door.  He  saw 
that  already  he  had  involved  himself  in  a  dozen  violations 
of  the  unionist  code  and  the  idea  of  trying  to  convince 
Harrigan  of  his  disinterestedness  did  not  occur  to  him. 

"Do  not  mind  me,"  he  said,  "I  am  going." 

He  walked  between  the  rows  of  frightened,  white-faced 
girls  and  unbolted  the  door,  the  Jewish  girl  following. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          303 

At  the  head  of  the  stairway  leading  to  the  street  he 
stopped  and  pointed  back  into  the  room. 

"Go  back,"  he  said,  handing  her  a  roll  of  bills.  "Carry 
on  the  work  if  you  can.  Get  other  machines  and  new 
printing.  I  will  help  you  in  secret/' 

Turning  he  ran  down  the  stairs,  hurried  through  the 
curious  crowd  standing  at  the  foot,  and  walked  rapidly 
along  in  front  of  the  lighted  stores.  A  cold  rain,  half 
snow,  was  falling.  Beside  him  walked  a  young  man 
with  a  brown  pointed  beard,  one  of  the  newspaper  re 
porters  who  had  interviewed  him  the  day  before. 

"Did  Harrigan  trim  you?"  asked  the  young  man,  and 
then  added,  laughing,  "He  told  us  he  intended  to  throw 
you  down  stairs." 

Sam  walked  on  in  silence,  filled  with  wrath.  He 
turned  into  a  side  street  and  stopped  when  his  compan 
ion  put  a  hand  upon  his  arm. 

"This  is  our  dump,"  said  the  young  man,  pointing  to  a 
long  low  frame  building  facing  the  side  street.  "Come 
in  and  let  us  have  your  story.  It  should  be  a  good  one." 

Inside  the  newspaper  office  another  young  man  sat  with 
his  head  lying  on  a  flat-top  desk.  He  was  clad  in  a 
strikingly  flashy  plaid  coat,  had  a  little,  wizened,  good- 
natured  face  and  seemed  to  have  been  drinking.  The 
young  man  with  the  beard  explained  Sam's  identity,  tak 
ing  the  sleeping  man  by  the  shoulder  and  shaking  him 
vigorously. 

"Wake  up,  Skipper!  There's  a  good  story  here!"  he 
shouted.  "The  union  has  thrown  out  the  mail-order 
strike  leader!" 

The  Skipper  got  to  his  feet  and  began  shaking  his 
head. 

"Of  course,  of  course,  Old  Top,  they  would  throw  you 
out.  You've  got  some  brains.  No  man  with  brains  can 
lead  a  strike.  It's  against  the  laws  of  Nature.  Some 
thing  was  bound  to  hit  you.  Did  Roughneck  come  out 


304          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

from  Pittsburgh  ?"  he  asked,  turning  to  the  young  man 
of  the  brown  beard. 

Then  reaching  above  his  head  and  taking  a  cap  that 
matched  his  plaid  coat  from  a  nail  on  the  wall,  he  winked 
at  Sam.  "Come  on,  Old  Top.  I've  got  to  get  a  drink." 

The  two  men  went  through  a  side  door  and  down  a 
dark  alley,  going  in  at  the  back  door  of  a  saloon.  Mud 
lay  deep  in  the  alley  and  The  Skipper  sloshed  through  it, 
splattering  Sam's  clothes  and  face.  In  the  saloon  at  a 
table  facing  Sam,  with  a  bottle  of  French  wine  between 
them,  he  began  explaining. 

"I've  a  note  coming  due  at  the  bank  in  the  morning 
and  no  money  to  pay  it,"  he  said.  "When  I  have  a 
note  coming  due  I  always  have  no  money  and  I  always 
get  drunk.  Then  next  morning  I  pay  the  note.  I  don't 
know  how  I  do  it,  but  I  always  come  out  all  right. 
It's  a  system —  Now  about  this  strike."  He  plunged  into 
a  discussion  of  the  strike  while  men  came  in  and  out, 
laughing  and  drinking.  At  ten  o'clock  the  proprietor 
locked  the  front  door,  drew  the  curtain,  and  coming  to 
the  back  of  the  room  sat  down  at  the  table  with  Sam  and 
The  Skipper,  bringing  another  bottle  of  the  French  wine 
from  which  the  two  men  continued  drinking. 

"That  man  from  Pittsburgh  busted  up  your  place,  eh  ?" 
he  said,  turning  to  Sam.  "A  man  came  in  here  to-night 
and  told  me.  He  sent  for  the  typewriter  people  and 
made  them  take  away  the  machines." 

When  they  were  ready  to  leave,  Sam  took  money  from 
his  pocket  and  offered  to  pay  for  the  bottle  of  French 
wine  ordered  by  The  Skipper,  who  arose  and  stood  un 
steadily  on  his  feet. 

"Do  you  mean  to  insult  me?"  he  demanded  indig 
nantly,  throwing  a  twenty-dollar  bill  on  the  table.  The 
proprietor  gave  him  back  only  fourteen  dollars. 

"I  might  as  well  wipe  off  the  slate  while  you're  flush," 
he  observed,  winking  at  Sam, 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  305 

The  Skipper  sat  down  again,  taking  a  pencil  and  pad 
of  paper  from  his  pocket,  and  throwing  them  on  the  table. 

"I  want  an  editorial  on  the  strike  for  the  Old  Rag," 
he  said  to  Sam.  "Do  one  for  me.  Do  something  strong. 
Get  a  punch  into  it.  I  want  to  talk  to  my  friend  here." 

Putting  the  pad  of  paper  on  the  table  Sam  began 
writing  his  newspaper  editorial.  His  head  seemed  won 
derfully  clear,  his  command  of  words  unusually  good. 
He  called  the  attention  of  the  public  to  the  situation, 
the  struggles  of  the  striking  girls  and  the  intelligent  fight 
they  had  been  making  to  win  a  just  cause,  following  this 
with  paragraphs  pointing  out  how  the  effectiveness  of 
the  work  done  had  been  annulled  by  the  position  taken 
by  the  labour  and  socialist  leaders. 

"These  fellows  at  bottom  care  nothing  for  results/' 
he  wrote.  "They  are  not  thinking  of  the  unemployed 
women  with  families  to  support,  they  are  thinking  only 
of  themselves  and  their  puny  leadership  which  they  fear 
is  threatened.  Now  we  shall  have  the  usual  exhibition 
of  all  the  old  things,  struggle,  and  hatred  and  defeat." 

When  he  had  finished  The  Skipper  and  Sam  went  back 
through  the  alley  to  the  newspaper  office.  The  Skipper 
sloshed  again  through  the  mud  and  carried  in  his  hand 
a  bottle  of  red  gin.  At  his  desk  he  took  the  editorial 
from  Sam's  hands  and  read  it. 

"Perfect!  Perfect  to  the  thousandth  part  of  an  inch, 
Old  Top,"  he  said,  pounding  Sam  on  the  shoulder.  "Just 
what  the  Old  Rag  wanted  to  say  about  the  strike."  Then 
climbing  upon  the  desk  and  putting  the  plaid  coat  under 
his  head  he  went  peacefully  to  sleep,  and  Sam,  sitting 
beside  the  desk  in  a  shaky  office  chair,  slept  also.  At 
daybreak  a  black  man  with  a  broom  in  his  hand  woke 
them,  and  going  into  a  long  low  room  filled  with  presses 
The  Skipper  put  his  head  under  a  water  tap  and  came 
back  waving  a  soiled  towel  and  with  water  dripping  from 
his  hair. 


306          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

"Now  for  the  day  and  the  labours  thereof,"  he  said, 
grinning  at  Sam  and  taking  a  long  drink  out  of  the  gin 
bottle. 

After  breakfast  he  and  Sam  took  up  their  stand  in 
front  of  the  barber  shop  opposite  the  stairway  leading 
to  the  shirtwaist  factory.  Sam's  girl  with  the  pamphlets 
was  gone  as  was  also  the  soft-eyed  Jewish  girl,  and  in 
their  places  Frank  and  the  Pittsburgh  leader  named  Har- 
rigan  walked  up  and  down.  Again  carriages  and  automo 
biles  stood  by  the  curb,  and  again  a  well-dressed  woman 
got  out  of  a  machine  and  went  toward  three  striking 
girls  approaching  along  the  sidewalk.  The  woman  was 
met  by  Harrigan,  shaking  his  fist  and  shouting,  and 
getting  back  into  the  machine  she  drove  off.  From  the 
stairway  the  flashily-dressed  Hebrew  looked  at  the  crowd 
and  laughed. 

"Where  is  the  new  strike  leader — the  mail-order  strike 
leader?"  he  called  to  Frank. 

With  the  words,  a  workingman  with  a  dinner  pail  on 
his  arm  ran  out  of  the  crowd  and  knocked  the  Jew  back 
into  the  stairway. 

"Punch  him!  Punch  the  dirty  scab  leader!"  yelled 
Frank,  dancing  up  and  down  on  the  sidewalk. 

Two  policemen  running  forward  began  leading  the 
workingman  up  the  street,  his  dinner  pail  still  clutched 
in  one  hand. 

"I  know  something,"  The  Skipper  shouted,  pounding 
Sam  on  the  shoulder.  "I  know  who  will  sign  that  note 
with  me.  The  woman  Harrigan  drove  back  into  her 
machine  is  the  richest  woman  in  town.  I  will  show  her 
your  editorial.  She  will  think  I  wrote  it  and  it  will  get 
her.  You'll  see."  He  ran  off  up  the  street,  shouting 
back  over  his  shoulder,  "Come  over  to  the  dump,  I  want 
to  see  you  again." 

Sam  returned  to  the  newspaper  office  and  sat  down 
waiting  for  The  Skipper  who,  after  a  time,  came  in,  took 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          307 

off  his  coat  and  began  writing  furiously.  From  time  to 
time  he  took  long  drinks  out  of  the  bottle  of  red  gin, 
and  after  silently  offering  it  to  Sam,  continued  reeling 
off  sheet  after  sheet  of  loosely-written  matter. 

"I  got  her  to  sign  the  note/'  he  called  over  his  shoulder 
to  Sam.  "She  was  furious  at  Harrigan  and  when  I  told 
her  we  were  going  to  attack  him  and  defend  you  she 
fell  for  it  quick.  I  won  out  by  following  my  system. 
I  always  get  drunk  and  it  always  wins." 

At  ten  o'clock  the  newspaper  office  was  in  a  ferment. 
The  little  man  with  the  brown  pointed  beard,  and  another, 
kept  running  to  The  Skipper  asking  advice,  laying  type 
written  sheets  before  him,  talking  as  he  wrote. 

"Give  me  a  lead.  I  want  one  more  front  page  lead/' 
The  Skipper  kept  bawling  at  them,  working  like  mad. 

At  ten  thirty  the  door  opened  and  Harrigan,  accom 
panied  by  Frank,  came  in.  Seeing  Sam  they  stopped, 
looking  at  him  uncertainly,  and  at  the  man  at  work  at  the 
desk. 

"Well,  speak  up.  This  is  no  ladies'  reception  room. 
What  do  you  fellows  want  ?"  snapped  The  Skipper,  glar 
ing  at  them. 

Frank,  coming  forward,  laid  a  typewritten  sheet  on 
the  desk,  which  the  newspaper  man  read  hurriedly.. 

"Will  you  use  it?"  asked  Frank. 

The  Skipper  laughed. 

"Wouldn't  change  a  word  of  it,"  he  shouted.  "Sure 
I'll  use  it.  It's  what  I  wanted  to  make  my  point.  You 
fellows  watch  me." 

Frank  and  Harrigan  went  out  and  The  Skipper,  rush 
ing  to  the  door,  began  yelling  into  the  room  beyond. 

"Hey,  you  Shorty  and  Tom,  I've  got  that  last  lead." 

Coming  back  to  his  desk  he  began  writing  again, 
grinning  as  he  worked.  To  Sam  he  handed  the  type 
written  sheet  prepared  by  Frank. 

"Dastardly  attempt  to  win  the  cause  of  the  working 


3o8          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

girls  by  dirty  scab  leaders  and  butter-fingered  capitalist 
class,"  it  began,  and  after  this  followed  a  wild  jumble 
of  words,  words  without  meaning,  sentences  without 
point  in  which  Sam  was  called  a  mealy-mouthed  mail 
order  musser  and  The  Skipper  was  mentioned  inciden 
tally  as  a  pusillanimous  ink  slinger. 

"I'll  run  the  stuff  and  comment  on  it,"  declared  The 
Skipper,  handing  Sam  what  he  had  written.  It  was  an 
editorial  inviting  the  public  to  read  the  article  prepared 
for  publication  by  the  strike  leaders  and  sympathising 
with  the  striking  girls  that  their  cause  had  to  be  lost 
because  of  the  incompetence  and  lack  of  intelligence  of 
their  leaders. 

"Hurrah  for  Roughhouse,  the  brave  man  who  leads 
working  girls  to  defeat  in  order  that  he  may  retain 
leadership  and  drive  intelligent  effort  out  of  the  cause 
of  labour,"  wrote  The  Skipper. 

Sam  looked  at  the  sheets  and  out  of  the  window  where 
a  snow  storm  raged.  It  seemed  to  him  that  a  crime  was 
being  done  and  he  was  sick  and  disgusted  at  his  own 
inability  to  stop  it.  The  Skipper  lighted  a  short  black 
pipe  and  took  his  cap  from  a  nail  on  the  wall. 

"I'm  the  smoothest  little  newspaper  thing  in  town  and 
some  financier  as  well,"  he  declared.  "Let's  go  have 
a  drink." 

After  the  drink  Sam  walked  through  the  town  toward 
the  country.  At  the  edge  of  town  where  the  houses  be 
came  scattered  and  the  road  started  to  drop  away  into 
a  deep  valley  some  one  helloed  behind  him.  Turning,  he 
saw  the  soft-eyed  Jewish  girl  running  along  a  path  beside 
the  road. 

"Where  are  you  going?"  he  asked,  stopping  to  lean 
against  a  board  fence,  the  snow  falling  upon  his  face. 

"I'm  going  with  you,"  said  the  girl.  "You're  the  best 
and  the  strongest  man  I've  ever  seen  and  I'm  not  going  to 
let  you  get  away.  If  you've  got  a  wife  it  don't  matter. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  309 

She  isn't  what  she  should  be  or  you  wouldn't  be  walking 
about  the  country  alone.  Harrigan  and  Frank  say  you're 
crazy,  but  I  know  better.  I  am  going  with  you  and  I'm 
going  to  help  you  find  what  you  want." 

Sam  wondered.  She  took  a  roll  of  bills  from  a  pocket 
in  her  dress  and  gave  it  to  him. 

"I  spent  three  hundred  and  fourteen  dollars,"  she  said. 

They  stood  looking  at  each  other.  She  put  out  a  hand 
and  laid  it  on  his  arm.  Her  eyes,  soft  and  now  glowing 
with  eager  light  looked  into  his.  Her  round  breasts  rose 
and  fell. 

"Anywhere  you  say.  I'll  be  your  servant  if  you  ask 
it  of  me." 

A  wave  of  hot  desire  ran  through  Sam  followed  by 
a  quick  reaction.  He  thought  of  his  months  of  weary 
seeking  and  his  universal  failure. 

"You  are  going  back  to  town  if  I  have  to  drive  you 
there  with  stones,"  he  told  her,  and  turning  ran  down 
the  valley  leaving  her  standing  by  the  board  fence,  her 
head  buried  in  her  arms. 


CHAPTER  V 

ONE  crisp  winter  evening  Sam  found  himself  on  a 
busy  street  corner  in  Rochester,  N.  Y.,  watching  from  a 
doorway  the  crowds  of  people  hurrying  or  loitering 
past  him.  He  stood  in  a  doorway  near  a  corner  that 
seemed  to  be  a  public  meeting  place  and  from  all  sides 
came  men  and  women  who  met  at  the  corner,  stood 
for  a  moment  in  talk,  and  then  went  away  together. 
Sam  found  himself  beginning  to  wonder  about  the  meet 
ings.  In  the  year  since  he  had  walked  out  of  the 
Chicago  office  his  mind  had  grown  more  and  more 
reflective.  Little  things — a  smile  on  the  lips  of  an  ill- 
clad  old  man  mumbling  and  hurrying  past  him  on  the 
street,  or  the  flutter  of  a  child's  hand  from  the  doorway 
of  a  farmhouse — had  furnished  him  food  for  hours 
of  thought.  Now  he  watched  with  interest  the  little 
incidents ;  the  nods,  the  hand  clasps,  the  hurried  stealthy 
glances  around  of  the  men  and  women  who  met  for  a 
moment  at  the  corner.  On  the  sidewalk  near  his  door 
way  several  middle-aged  men,  evidently  from  a  large  hotel 
around  the  corner,  were  eyeing,  with  unpleasant,  hungry, 
furtive  eyes  the  women  in  the  crowd. 

A  large  blond  woman  stepped  into  the  doorway  beside 
Sam.  "Waiting  for  some  one?"  she  asked,  smiling  and 
looking  steadily  at  him,  with  the  harried,  uncertain,  hun 
gry  light  he  had  seen  in  the  eyes  of  the  middle-aged 
men  upon  the  sidewalk. 

"What  are  you  doing  here  with  your  husband  at 
work?"  he  ventured. 

She  looked  startled  and  then  laughed. 

310 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          311 

"Why  don't  you  hit  me  with  your  fist  if  you  want 
to  jolt  me  like  that?"  she  demanded,  adding,  "I  don't 
know  who  you  are,  but  whoever  you  are  I  want  to  tell 
you  that  I've  quit  my  husband." 

"Why?"  asked  Sam. 

She  laughed  again  and  stepping  over  looked  at  him 
closely. 

"I  guess  you're  bluffing,"  she  said.  "I  don't  believe 
you  know  Alf  at  all.  And  I'm  glad  you  don't.  I've 
quit  Alf,  but  he  would  raise  Cain  just  the  same,  if  he 
saw  me  out  here  hustling." 

Sam  stepped  out  of  the  doorway  and  walked  down  a 
side  street  past  a  lighted  theatre.  Along  the  street  women 
raised  their  eyes  to  him  and  beyond  the  theatre,  a  young 
girl,  brushing  against  him,  muttered,  "Hello,  Sport!" 

Sam  wanted  to  get  away  from  the  unhealthy  hungry 
look  he  had  seen  in  the  eyes  of  the  men  and  women. 
His  mind  began  working  on  this  side  of  the  lives  of  great 
numbers  of  people  in  the  cities — of  the  men  and  women 
on  the  street  corner,  of  the  woman  who  from  the  security 
of  a  safe  marriage  had  once  thrown  a  challenge  into 
his  eyes  as  they  sat  together  in  the  theatre,  and  of  the 
thousand  little  incidents  in  the  lives  of  all  modern  city 
men  and  women.  He  wondered  how  much  that  eager, 
aching  hunger  stood  in  the  way  of  men's  getting  hold 
of  life  and  living  it  earnestly  and  purposefully,  as  he 
wanted  to  live  it,  and  as  he  felt  all  men  and  women 
wanted  at  bottom  to  live  it. 

When  he  was  a  boy  in  Caxton  he  was  more  than  once 
startled  by  the  flashes  of  brutality  and  coarseness  in 
the  speech  and  actions  of  kindly,  well-meaning  men ;  now 
as  he  walked  in  the  streets  of  the  city  he  thought  that 
he  had  got  past  being  startled.  "It  is  a  quality  of  our 
lives,"  he  decided.  "American  men  and  women  have 
not  learned  to  be  clean  and  noble  and  natural,  like  their 
forests  and  their  wide,  clean  plains." 


312          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

He  thought  of  what  he  had  heard  of  London,  and  of 
Paris,  and  of  other  cities  of  the  old  world;  and  following 
an  impulse  acquired  through  his  lonely  wanderings,  began 
talking  to  himself. 

"We  are  no  finer  nor  cleaner  than  these,"  he  said, 
"and  we  sprang  from  the  big  clean  new  land  through 
which  I  have  been  walking  all  these  months.  Will  man 
kind  always  go  on  with  that  old  aching,  queerly  expressed 
hunger  in  its  blood,  and  with  that  look  in  its  eyes  ?  Will 
it  never  shrive  itself  and  understand  itself,  and  turn 
fiercely  and  energetically  toward  the  building  of  a  bigger 
and  cleaner  race  of  men?" 

"It  won't  unless  you  help,"  came  the  answer  from 
some  hidden  part  of  him. 

Sam  fell  to  thinking  of  the  men  who  write,  and  of 
those  who  teach,  and  he  wondered  why  they  did  not,  all 
of  them,  talk  more  thoughtfully  of  vice,  and  why  they  so 
often  spent  their  talents  and  their  energies  in  futile  attacks 
upon  some  phase  of  life,  and  ended  their  efforts  toward 
human  betterment  by  joining  or  promoting  a  temper 
ance  league,  or  stopping  the  playing  of  baseball  on 
Sunday. 

As  a  matter  of  fact  were  not  many  writers  and  re 
formers  unconsciously  in  league  with  the  procurer,  in 
that  they  treated  vice  and  profligacy  as  something,  at 
bottom,  charming?  He  himself  had  seen  none  of  this 
vague  charm. 

"For  me,"  he  reflected,  "there  have  been  no  Frangois 
Villons  or  Sapphos  in  the  tenderloins  of  American  cities. 
There  have  been  instead  only  heart-breaking  disease 
and  ill  health  and  poverty,  and  hard  brutal  faces  and  torn, 
greasy  finery." 

He  thought  of  men  like  Zola  who  saw  this  side  of 
life  clearly  and  how  he,  as  a  young  fellow  in  the  city, 
had  read  the  man  at  Janet  Eberly's  suggestion  and  had 
been  helped  by  him — helped  and  frightened  and  made  to 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          313 

see.  And  then  there  rose  before  him  the  leering  face  of 
a  keeper  of  a  second-hand  book  store  in  Cleveland  who 
some  weeks  before  had  pushed  across  the  counter  to  him 
a  paper-covered  copy  of  "Nana's  Brother,"  saying  with  a 
smirk,  "That's  some  sporty  stuff."  And  he  wondered 
what  he  should  have  thought  had  he  bought  the  book 
to  feed  the  imagination  the  bookseller's  comment  was  in 
tended  to  arouse. 

In  the  small  towns  through  which  Sam  walked  and 
in  the  small  town  in  which  he  grew  to  manhood  vice 
was  openly  crude  and  masculine.  It  went  to  sleep  sprawl 
ing  across  a  dirty  beer-soaked  table  in  Art  Sherman's 
saloon  in  Piety  Hollow,  and  the  newsboy  passed  it  with 
out  comment,  regretting  that  it  slept  and  that  it  had  no 
money  with  which  to  buy  papers. 

"Dissipation  and  vice  get  into  the  life  of  youth/'  he 
thought,  coming  to  a  street  corner  where  young  men 
played  pool  and  smoked  cigarettes  in  a  dingy  poolroom, 
and  turned  back  toward  the  heart  of  the  city.  "It  gets 
into  all  modern  life.  The  farmer  boy  coming  up  to  the 
city  to  work  hears  lewd  stories  in  the  smoking  car  of  the 
train,  and  the  travelling  men  from  the  cities  tell  tales 
of  the  city  streets  to  the  group  about  the  stove  in 
village  stores." 

Sam  did  not  quarrel  with  the  fact  that  youth  touched 
vice.  Such  things  were  a  part  of  the  world  that  men 
and  women  had  made  for  their  sons  and  daughters  to 
live  in,  and  that  night  as  he  wandered  in  the  streets  of 
Rochester  he  thought  that  he  would  like  all  youth  to 
know,  if  they  could  but  know,  truth.  His  heart  was 
bitter  at  the  thought  of  men  throwing  the  glamour  of 
romance  over  the  sordid,  ugly  things  he  had  been  seeing 
in  that  city  and  in  every  city  he  had  known. 

Past  him  in  a  street  lined  with  small  frame  houses 
stumbled  a  man  far  gone  in  drink,  by  whose  side  walked 
a  boy,  and  Sam's  mind  leaped  back  to  those  first  years 


3i4          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

he  had  spent  in  the  city  and  of  the  staggering  old  man  he 
had  left  behind  him  in  Caxton. 

"You  would  think  no  man  better  armed  against  vice 
and  dissipation  than  that  painter's  son  of  Caxton,"  he 
reminded  himself,  "and  yet  he  embraced  vice.  He 
found,  as  all  young  men  find,  that  there  is  much  mis 
leading  talk  and  writing  on  the  subject.  The  business 
men  he  knew  did  not  part  with  able  assistance  because 
it  did  not  sign  the  pledge.  Ability  was  too  rare  a 
thing  and  too  independent  to  sign  pledges,  and  the 
lips-that-touch-liquor-shall-never-touch-mine  sentiment 
among  women  was  reserved  for  the  lips  that  did  not 
invite." 

He  began  reviewing  incidents  of  carouses  he  had  been 
on  with  business  men  of  his  acquaintance,  of  a  police 
man  knocked  into  a  street  and  of  himself,  quiet  and  ably 
climbing  upon  tables  to  make  speeches  and  to  shout  the 
innermost  secrets  of  his  heart  to  drunken  hangers-on  in 
Chicago  barrooms.  Normally  he  had  not  been  a  good 
mixer.  He  had  been  one  to  keep  himself  to  himself. 
But  on  these  carouses  he  let  himself  go,  and  got  a 
reputation  for  daring  audacity  by  slapping  men  on  the 
back  and  singing  songs  with  them.  A  glowing  cordiality 
had  pervaded  him  and  for  a  time  he  had  really  be 
lieved  there  was  such  a  thing  as  high  flying  vice  that 
glistens  in  the  sun. 

Now  stumbling  past  lighted  saloons,  wandering  un 
known  in  a  city's  streets,  he  knew  better.  All  vice  was 
unclean,  unhealthy. 

He  remembered  a  hotel  in  which  he  had  once  slept, 
a  hotel  that  admitted  questionable  couples.  Its  halls  had 
become  dingy;  its  windows  remained  unopened;  dirt 
gathered  in  the  corners;  the  attendants  shuffled  as  they 
walked,  and  leered  into  the  faces  of  creeping  couples; 
the  curtains  at  the  windows  were  torn  and  discoloured ; 
strange  snarling  oaths,  screams  and  cries  jarred  the  tense 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          315 

nerves;  peace  and  cleanliness  had  fled  the  place;  men 
hurried  through  the  halls  with  hats  drawn  down  over 
their  faces ;  sunlight  and  fresh  air  and  cheerful,  whistling 
bellboys  were  locked  out. 

He  thought  of  the  weary,  restless  walks  taken  by  the 
young  men  from  farms  and  country  towns  in  the  streets 
of  the  cities;  young  men  believers  in  the  golden  vice. 
Hands  beckoned  to  them  from  doorways,  and  women  of 
the  town  laughed  at  their  awkwardness.  In  Chicago  he 
had  walked  in  that  way.  He  also  had  been  seeking,  seek 
ing  the  romantic,  impossible  mistress  that  lurked  at  the 
bottom  of  men's  tales  of  the  submerged  world.  He 
wanted  his  golden  girl.  He  was  like  the  naive  German 
lad  in  the  South  Water  street  warehouses  who  had  once 
said  to  him — he  was  a  frugal  soul — "I  would  like  to  find 
a  nice-looking  girl  who  is  quiet  and  modest  and  who 
will  be  my  mistress  and  not  charge  anything." 

Sam  had  not  found  his  golden  girl,  and  now  he  knew 
she  did  not  exist.  He  had  not  seen  the  places  called  by 
the  preachers  the  palaces  of  sin,  and  now  he  knew  there 
were  no  such  places.  He  wondered  why  youth  could  not 
be  made  to  understand  that  sin  is  foul  and  that  immo 
rality  reeks  of  vulgarity.  Why  could  not  they  be  told 
plainly  that  there  are  no  housecleaning  days  in  the  ten 
derloin  ? 

During  his  married  life  men  had  come  to  the  house 
who  discussed  this  matter.  One  of  them,  he  remembered, 
had  maintained  stoutly  that  the  scarlet  sisterhood  was  a 
necessity  of  modern  life  and  that  ordinary  decent  social 
life  could  not  go  on  without  it.  Often  during  the  past 
year  Sam  had  thought  of  the  man's  talk  and  his  brain 
had  reeled  before  the  thought.  In  towns  and  on  country 
roads  he  had  seen  troops  of  little  girls  come  laughing  and 
shouting  out  of  school  houses,  and  had  wondered  which 
of  them  would  be  chosen  for  that  service  to  mankind; 
and  now,  in  his  hour  of  depression,  he  wished  that  the 


316          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

man  who  had  talked  at  his  dinner  table  might  be  made  to 
walk  with  him  and  to  share  with  him  his  thoughts. 

Turning  again  into  a  lighted  busy  thoroughfare  of  the 
city,  Sam  continued  his  study  of  the  faces  in  the  crowds. 
To  do  this  quieted  and  soothed  his  mind.  He  began  to 
feel  a  weariness  in  his  legs  and  thought  with  gratitude 
that  he  should  have  a  night  of  good  sleep.  The  sea  of 
faces  rolling  up  to  him  under  the  lights  filled  him  with 
peace.  "There  is  so  much  of  life,"  he  thought,  "it 
must  come  to  some  end." 

Looking  intently  at  the  faces,  the  dull  faces  and  the 
bright  faces,  the  faces  drawn  out  of  shape  and  with  eyes 
nearly  meeting  above  the  nose,  the  faces  with  long,  heavy 
sensual  jaws,  and  the  empty,  soft  faces  on  which  the 
scalding  finger  of  thought  had  left  no  mark,  his  fingers 
ached  to  get  a  pencil  in  his  hand,  or  to  spread  the  faces 
upon  canvas  in  enduring  pigments,  to  hold  them  up  be 
fore  the  world  and  to  be  able  to  say,  "Here  are  the  faces 
you,  by  your  lives,  have  made  for  yourselves  and  for 
your  children." 

In  the  lobby  of  a  tall  office  building,  where  he  stopped 
at  a  little  cigar  counter  to  get  fresh  tobacco  for  his  pipe, 
he  looked  so  fixedly  at  a  woman  clad  in  long  soft  furs, 
that  in  alarm  she  hurried  out  to  her  machine  to  wait  for 
her  escort,  who  had  evidently  gone  up  the  elevator. 

Once  more  in  the  street,  Sam  shuddered  at  the  thought 
of  the  hands  that  had  laboured  that  the  soft  cheeks  and 
the  untroubled  eyes  of  this  one  woman  might  be.  Into 
his  mind  came  the  face  and  figure  of  a  little  Canadian 
nurse  who  had  once  cared  for  him  through  an  illness — 
her  quick,  deft  fingers  and  her  muscular  little  arms. 
"Another  such  as  she,"  he  muttered,  "has  been  at  work 
upon  the  face  and  body  of  this  gentlewoman;  a  hunter 
has  gone  into  the  white  silence  of  the  north  to  bring  out 
the  warm  furs  that  adorn  her;  for  her  there  has  been 
a  tragedy — a  shot,  and  red  blood  upon  the  snow,  and  a 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          317 

struggling  beast  waving  its  little  claws  in  the  air;  for 
her  a  woman  has  worked  through  the  morning,  bathing 
her  white  limbs,  her  cheeks,  her  hair." 

For  this  gentlewoman  also  there  had  been  a  man 
apportioned,  a  man  like  himself,  who  had  cheated  and 
lied  and  gone  through  the  years  in  pursuit  of  the  dollars 
to  pay  all  of  the  others,  a  man  of  power,  a  man  who 
could  achieve,  could  accomplish. 

Again  he  felt  within  him  a  yearning  for  the  power  of 
the  artist,  the  power  not  only  to  see  the  meaning  of  the 
faces  in  the  street,  but  to  reproduce  what  he  saw,  to  get 
with  subtle  fingers  the  story  of  the  achievement  of  man 
kind  into  a  face  hanging  upon  a  wall. 

In  other  days,  in  Caxton,  listening  to  Telfer's  talk, 
and  in  Chicago  and  New  York  with  Sue,  Sam  had  tried 
to  get  an  inkling  of  the  passion  of  the  artist;  now  walk 
ing  and  looking  at  the  faces  rolling  past  him  on  the  long 
street  he  thought  that  he  did  understand. 

Once  when  he  was  new  in  the  city  he  had,  for  some 
months,  carried  on  an  affair  with  a  woman,  the  daughter 
of  a  cattle  farmer  from  Iowa.  Now  her  face  filled  his 
vision.  How  rugged  it  was,  how  filled  with  the  message 
of  the  ground  underfoot ;  the  thick  lips,  the  dull  eyes,  the 
strong,  bullet-like  head,  how  like  the  cattle  her  father 
had  bought  and  sold.  He  remembered  the  little  room 
in  Chicago  where  he  had  his  first  love  passage  with  this 
woman.  How  frank  and  wholesome  it  had  seemed. 
How  eagerly  both  man  and  woman  had  rushed  at  evening 
to  the  meeting  place.  How  her  strong  hands  had  clasped 
him.  The  face  of  the  woman  in  the  motor  by  the  office 
building  danced  before  his  eyes,  the  face  so  peaceful, 
so  free  from  the  marks  of  human  passion,  and  he  won 
dered  what  daughter  of  a  cattle  raiser  had  taken  the 
passion  out  of  the  man  who  paid  for  the  beauty  of  that 
face. 

On  a  side  street,  near  the  lighted  front  of  a  cheap 


3i8          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

theatre,  a  woman,  standing  alone  and  half  concealed  in 
the  doorway  of  a  church,  called  softly,  and  turning  he 
went  to  her. 

"I  am  not  a  customer,"  he  said,  looking  at  her  thin 
face  and  bony  hands,  "but  if  you  care  to  come  with  me 
I  will  stand  a  good  dinner.  I  am  getting  hungry  and  do 
not  like  eating  alone.  I  want  some  one  to  talk  to  me  so 
that  I  won't  get  to  thinking." 

"You're  a  queer  bird,"  said  the  woman,  taking  his 
arm.  "What  have  you  done  that  you  don't  want  to 
think?" 

Sam  said  nothing. 

"There's  a  place  over  there,"  she  said,  pointing  to 
the  lighted  front  of  a  cheap  restaurant  with  soiled  cur 
tains  at  the  windows. 

Sam  kept  on  walking. 

"If  you  do  not  mind,"  he  said,  "I  will  pick  the  place. 
I  want  to  buy  a  good  dinner.  I  want  a  place  with 
clean  linen  on  the  table  and  a  good  cook  in  the 
kitchen." 

They  stopped  at  a  corner  to  talk  of  the  dinner,  and 
at  her  suggestion  he  waited  at  a  near-by  drug  store  while 
she  went  to  her  room.  As  he  waited  he  went  to  the 
telephone  and  ordered  the  dinner  and  a  taxicab.  When 
she  returned  she  had  on  a  clean  shirtwaist  and  had 
combed  her  hair.  Sam  thought  he  caught  the  odour  of 
benzine,  and  guessed  she  had  been  at  work  on  the  spots 
on  her  worn  jacket.  She  seemed  surprised  to  find  him 
still  waiting. 

"I  thought  maybe  it  was  a  stall,"  she  said. 

They  drove  in  silence  to  a  place  Sam  had  in  mind, 
a  roadhouse  with  clean  washed  floors,  painted  walls 
and  open  fires  in  the  private  dining-rooms.  Sam  had 
been  there  several  times  during  the  month,  and  the  food 
had  been  well  cooked. 

They  ate  in  silence.     Sam  had  no  curiosity  to  hear 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          319 

her  talk  of  herself,  and  she  seemed  to  have  no  knack  of 
casual  conversation.  He  was  not  studying  her,  but  had 
brought  her  as  he  had  said,  because  of  his  loneliness, 
and  because  her  thin,  tired  face  and  frail  body,  looking 
out  from  the  darkness  by  the  church  door,  had  made  an 
appeal. 

She  had,  he  thought,  a  look  of  hard  chastity,  like  one 
whipped  but  not  defeated.  Her  cheeks  were  thin 
and  covered  with  freckles,  like  a  boy's.  Her  teeth 
were  broken  and  in  bad  repair,  though  clean,  and  her 
hands  had  the  worn,  hardly-used  look  of  his  own 
mother's  hands.  Now  that  she  sat  before  him  in 
the  restaurant,  in  some  vague  way  she  resembled  his 
mother. 

After  dinner  he  sat  smoking  his  cigar  and  looking  at 
the  fire.  The  woman  of  the  streets  leaned  across  the 
table  and  touched  him  on  the  arm. 

"Are  you  going  to  take  me  anywhere  after  this — after 
we  leave  here?"  she  said. 

"I  am  going  to  take  you  to  the  door  of  your  room, 
that's  all." 

"I'm  glad,"  she  said ;  "it's  a  long  time  since  I've  had 
an  evening  like  this.  It  makes  me  feel  clean." 

For  a  time  they  sat  in  silence  and  then  Sam  began 
talking  of  his  home  town  in  Iowa,  letting  himself  go 
and  expressing  the  thoughts  that  came  into  his  mind. 
He  told  her  of  his  mother  and  of  Mary  Underwood 
and  she  in  turn  told  of  her  town  and  of  her  life.  She 
had  some  difficulty  about  hearing  which  made  conversa 
tion  trying.  Words  and  sentences  had  to  be  repeated  to 
her  and  after  a  time  Sam  smoked  and  looked  at  the  fire, 
letting  her  talk.  Her  father  had  been  a  captain  of  a 
small  steamboat  plying  up  and  down  Long  Island  Sound 
and  her  mother  a  careful,  shrewd  woman  and  a  good 
housekeeper.  They  had  lived  in  a  Rhode  Island  village 
and  had  a  garden  back  of  their  house.  The  captain 


320          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

had  not  married  until  he  was  forty-five  and  had  died 
when  the  girl  was  eighteen,  the  mother  dying  a  year 
later. 

The  girl  had  not  been  much  known  in  the  Rhode  Island 
village,  being  shy  and  reticent.  She  had  kept  the  house 
clean  and  helped  the  captain  in  the  garden.  When  her 
parents  were  dead  she  had  found  herself  alone  with 
thirty-seven  hundred  dollars  in  the  bank  and  the  little 
home,  and  had  married  a  young  man  who  was  a  clerk 
in  a  railroad  office,  and  sold  the  house  to  move  to 
Kansas  City.  The  big  flat  country  frightened  her.  Her 
life  there  had  been  unsuccessful.  She  had  been  lonely 
for  the  hills  and  the  water  of  her  New  England  village, 
and  she  was,  by  nature,  undemonstrative  and  unemo 
tional,  so  that  she  did  not  get  much  hold  of  her  husband. 
He  had  undoubtedly  married  her  for  the  little  hoard  and, 
by  various  devices,  began  getting  it  from  her.  A  son 
had  been  born,  for  a  time  her  health  broke  badly,  and 
she  discovered  through  an  accident  that  her  husband 
was  spending  her  money  in  dissipation  among  the  women 
of  the  town. 

"There  wasn't  any  use  wasting  words  when  I  found 
he  didn't  care  for  me  or  for  the  baby  and  wouldn't  sup 
port  us,  so  I  left  him/'  she  said  in  a  level,  businesslike 
way. 

When  she  came  to  count  up,  after  she  had  got  clear 
of  her  husband  and  had  taken  a  course  in  stenography, 
there  was  one  thousand  dollars  of  her  savings  left  and 
she  felt  pretty  safe.  She  took  a  position  and  went  to 
work,  feeling  well  satisfied  and  happy.  And  then  came 
the  trouble  with  her  hearing.  She  began  to  lose  places 
and  finally  had  to  be  content  with  a  small  salary,  earned 
by  copying  form  letters  for  a  mail  order  medicine  man. 
The  boy  she  put  out  with  a  capable  German  woman,  the 
wife  of  a  gardener.  She  paid  four  dollars  a  week  for  him 
and  there  was  clothing  to  be  bought  for  herself  and  the 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          321 

boy.  Her  wage  from  the  medicine  man  was  seven  dol 
lars  a  week. 

"And  so,"  she  said,  "I  began  going  on  the  street.  I 
knew  no  one  and  there  was  nothing  else  to  do.  I  couldn't 
do  that  in  the  town  where  the  boy  lived,  so  I  came  away. 
I've  gone  from  city  to  city,  working  mostly  for  patent 
medicine  men  and  filling  out  my  income  by  what  I 
earned  in  the  streets.  I'm  not  naturally  a  woman  who 
cares  about  men  and  not  many  of  them  care  about  me. 
I  don't  like  to  have  them  touch  me  with  their  hands. 
I  can't  drink  as  most  of  the  girls  do;  it  sickens  me.  I 
want  to  be  left  alone.  Perhaps  I  shouldn't  have  married. 
Not  that  I  minded  my  husband.  We  got  along  very 
well  until  I  had  to  stop  giving  him  money.  When  I  found 
where  it  was  going  it  opened  my  eyes.  I  felt  that  I 
had  to  have  at  least  a  thousand  dollars  for  the  boy  in 
case  anything  happened  to  me.  When  I  found  there 
wasn't  anything  to  do  but  just  go  on  the  streets,  I  went. 
I  tried  doing  other  work,  but  hadn't  the  strength, 
and  when  it  came  to  the  test  I  cared  more  about  the 
boy  than  I  did  about  myself — any  woman  would. 
I  thought  he  was  of  more  importance  than  what  I 
wanted. 

"It  hasn't  been  easy  for  me.  Sometimes  when  I  have 
got  a  man  to  go  with  me  I  walk  along  the  street  praying 
that  I  won't  shudder  and  draw  away  when  he  touches 
me  with  his  hands.  I  know  that  if  I  do  he  will  go  away 
and  I  won't  get  any  money. 

"And  then  they  talk  and  lie  about  themselves.  I've 
had  them  try  to  work  off  bad  money  and  worthless 
jewellry  on  me.  Sometimes  they  try  to  make  love  to  me 
and  then  steal  back  the  money  they  have  given  me. 
That's  the  hard  part,  the  lying  and  the  pretence.  All 
day  I  write  the  same  lies  over  and  over  for  the  patent- 
medicine  men  and  then  at  night  I  listen  to  these  others 
lying  to  me." 


322          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

She  stopped  talking  and  leaning  over  put  her 
cheek  down  on  her  hand  and  sat  looking  into  the 
fire. 

"My  mother,"  she  began  again,  "didn't  always  wear 
a  clean  dress.  She  couldn't.  She  was  always  down  on 
her  knees  scrubbing  around  the  floor  or  out  in  the  garden 
pulling  weeds.  But  she  hated  dirt.  If  her  dress  was 
dirty  her  underwear  was  clean  and  so  was  her  body. 
She  taught  me  to  be  that  way  and  I  wanted  to  be.  It 
came  naturally.  But  I'm  losing  it  all.  All  evening  I 
have  been  sitting  here  with  you  thinking  that  my  under 
wear  isn't  clean.  Most  of  the  time  I  don't  care.  Being 
clean  doesn't  go  with  what  I  am  doing.  I  have  to 
keep  trying  to  be  flashy  outside  so  that  men  will  stop 
when  they  see  me  on  the  street.  Sometimes  when  I  have 
done  well  I  don't  go  on  the  streets  for  three  or  four 
weeks.  Then  I  clean  up  my  room  and  bathe  myself. 
My  landlady  lets  me  do  my  washing  in  the  basement 
at  night.  I  don't  seem  to  care  about  cleanliness  the 
weeks  I  am  on  the  streets." 

The  little  German  orchestra  began  playing  a  lullaby 
and  a  fat  German  waiter  came  in  at  the  open  door  and 
put  more  wood  on  the  fire.  He  stopped  by  the  table  and 
talked  about  the  mud  in  the  road  outside.  From  another 
room  came  the  silvery  clink  of  glasses  and  the  sound 
of  laughing  voices.  The  girl  and  Sam  drifted  back  into 
talk  of  their  home  towns.  Sam  felt  that  he  liked  her 
very  much  and  thought  that  if  she  had  belonged  to  him 
he  should  have  found  a  basis  on  which  to  live  with  her 
contentedly.  She  had  a  quality  of  honesty  that  he  was 
always  seeking  in  people. 

As  they  drove  back  to  the  city  she  put  a  hand  on 
his  arm. 

"I  wouldn't  mind  about  you,"  she  said,  looking  at 
him  frankly. 

Sam  laughed  and  patted  her  thin  hand.     "It's  been 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  323 

a  good  evening,"  he  said,  "we'll  go  through  with  it  as 
it  stands." 

"Thanks  for  that/'  she  said,  "and  there  is  something 
else  I  want  to  tell  you.  Perhaps  you  will  think  it  bad 
of  me.  Sometimes  when  I  don't  want  to  go  on  the 
streets  I  get  down  on  my  knees  and  pray  for  strength 
to  go  on  gamely.  Does  it  seem  bad  ?  We  are  a  praying 
people,  we  New  Englanders." 

As  he  stood  in  the  street  Sam  could  hear  her  laboured 
asthmatic  breathing  as  she  climbed  the  stairs  to  her 
room.  Half  way  up  she  stopped  and  waved  her  hand 
at  him.  The  thing  was  awkwardly  done  and  boyish. 
Sam  had  a  feeling  that  he  should  like  to  get  a  gun  and 
begin  shooting  citizens  in  the  streets.  He  stood  in  the 
lighted  city  looking  down  the  long  deserted  street  and 
thought  of  Mike  McCarthy  in  the  jail  at  Caxton.  Like 
Mike,  he  lifted  up  his  voice  in  the  night. 

"Are  you  there,  O  God?  Have  you  left  your  chil 
dren  here  on  the  earth  hurting  each  other  ?  Do  you  put 
the  seed  of  a  million  children  in  a  man,  and  the  planting 
of  a  forest  in  one  tree,  and  permit  men  to  wreck  and 
hurt  and  destroy?" 


CHAPTER  VI 

ONE  morning,  at  the  end  of  his  second  year  of  wan 
dering,  Sam  got  out  of  his  bed  in  a  cold  little  hotel  in 
a  mining  village  in  West  Virginia,  looked  at  the  miners, 
their  lamps  in  their  caps,  going  through  the  dimly  lighted 
streets,  ate  a  portion  of  leathery  breakfast  cakes,  paid 
his  bill  at  the  hotel,  and  took  a  train  for  New  York. 
He  had  definitely  abandoned  the  idea  of  getting  at  what 
he  wanted  through  wandering  about  the  country  and 
talking  to  chance  acquaintances  by  the  wayside  and  in 
villages,  and  had  decided  to  return  to  a  way  of  life 
more  befitting  his  income. 

He  felt  that  he  was  not  by  nature  a  vagabond,  and 
that  the  call  of  the  wind  and  the  sun  and  the  brown 
road  was  not  insistent  in  his  blood.  The  spirit  of  Pan 
did  not  command  him,  and  although  there  were  certain 
spring  mornings  of  his  wandering  days  that  were  like 
mountain  tops  in  his  experience  of  life,  mornings  when 
some  strong,  sweet  feeling  ran  through  the  trees,  and 
the  grass,  and  the  body  of  the  wanderer,  and  when  the 
call  of  life  seemed  to  come  shouting  and  inviting  down 
the  wind,  filling  him  with  delight  of  the  blood  in  his 
body  and  the  thoughts  in  his  brain,  yet  at  bottom  and  in 
spite  of  these  days  of  pure  joy  he  was,  after  all,  a  man 
of  the  towns  and  the  crowds.  Caxton  and  South  Water 
Street  and  LaSalle  Street  had  all  left  their  marks  on 
him,  and  so,  throwing  his  canvas  jacket  into  a  corner 
of  the  room  in  the  West  Virginia  hotel,  he  returned  to 
the  haunts  of  his  kind. 

In  New  York  he  went  to  an  uptown  club  where  he 

324 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          325 

owned  a  membership  and  into  the  grill  where  he  found 
at  breakfast  an  actor  acquaintance  named  Jackson. 

Sam  dropped  into  a  chair  and  looked  about  him.  He 
remembered  a  visit  he  had  made  there  some  years  before 
with  Webster  and  Crofts  and  felt  again  the  quiet  ele 
gance  of  the  surroundings. 

"Hello,  Moneymaker/'  said  Jackson,  heartily.  "  Heard 
you  had  gone  to  a  nunnery." 

Sam  laughed  and  began  ordering  a  breakfast  that 
made  Jackson's  eyes  open  with  astonishment. 

"You,  Mr.  Elegance,  would  not  understand  a  man's 
spending  month  after  month  in  the  open  air  seeking  a 
good  body  and  an  end  in  life  and  then  suddenly  chang 
ing  his  mind  and  coming  back  to  a  place  like  this,"  he 
observed. 

Jackson  laughed  and  lighted  a  cigarette. 

"How  little  you  know  me,"  he  said.  "I  would  live 
my  life  in  the  open  but  that  I  am  a  mighty  good  actor 
and  have  just  finished  another  long  New  York  run. 
What  are  you  going  to  do  now  that  you  are  thin  and 
brown?  Will  you  go  back  to  Morrison  and  Prince  and 
money  making?" 

Sam  shook  his  head  and  looked  at  the  quiet  elegance 
of  the  man  before  him.  How  satisfied  and  happy  he 
looked. 

"I  am  going  to  try  living  among  the  rich  and  the 
leisurely,"  he  said. 

"They  are  a  rotten  crew,"  Jackson  assured  him,  "and 
I  am  taking  a  night  train  for  Detroit.  Come  with  me. 
We  will  talk  things  over." 

On  the  train  that  night  they  got  into  talk  with  a 
broad-shouldered  old  man  who  told  them  of  a  hunting 
trip  on  which  he  was  bound. 

"I  am  going  to  sail  from  Seattle,"  he  said,  "and  go 
everywhere  and  hunt  everything.  I  am  going  to  shoot 
the  head  off  of  every  big  animal  kind  of  thing  left  in 


326          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

the  world  and  then  come  back  to  New  York  and  stay 
there  until  I  die/' 

"I  will  go  with  you,"  said  Sam,  and  in  the  morning  left 
Jackson  at  Detroit  and  continued  westward  with  his 
new  acquaintance. 

For  months  Sam  travelled  and  shot  with  the  old  man, 
a  vigorous,  big-hearted  old  fellow  who,  having  become 
wealthy  through  an  early  investment  in  stock  of  the 
Standard  Oil  Company,  devoted  his  life  to  his  lusty, 
primitive  passion  for  shooting  and  killing.  They  went 
on  lion  hunts,  elephant  hunts  and  tiger  hunts,  and  when 
on  the  west  coast  of  Africa  Sam  took  a  boat  for  London, 
his  companion  walked  up  and  down  the  beach  smoking 
black  cheroots  and  declaring  the  fun  was  only  half 
over  and  that  Sam  was  a  fool  to  go. 

After  the  year  of  the  hunt  royal  Sam  spent  another 
year  living  the  life  of  a  gentleman  of  wealth  and  leisure 
in  London,  New  York,  and  Paris.  He  went  on  auto 
mobile  trips,  fished  and  loafed  along  the  shores  of  north 
ern  lakes,  canoed  through  Canada  with  a  writer  of 
Nature  books,  and  sat  about  clubs  and  fashionable  hotels 
listening  to  the  talk  of  the  men  and  women  of  that 
world. 

Late  one  afternoon  in  the  spring  of  the  year  he  went 
to  the  village  on  the  Hudson  River  where  Sue  had  taken 
a  house,  and  almost  immediately  saw  her.  For  an  hour 
he  followed,  watching  her  quick,  active  little  figure 
as  she  walked  through  the  village  streets,  and  wondering 
what  life  had  come  to  mean  to  her,  but  when,  turning 
suddenly,  she  would  have  come  face  to  face  with  him, 
he  hurried  down  a  side  street  and  took  a  train  to  the 
city  feeling  that  he  could  not  face  her  empty-handed 
and  ashamed  after  the  years. 

In  the  end  he  started  drinking  again,  not  moderately 
now,  but  steadily  and  almost  continuously.  One  night 
in  Detroit,  with  three  young  men  from  his  hotel,  he 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          327 

got  drunk  and  was,  for  the  first  time  since  his  parting 
with  Sue,  in  the  company  of  women.  Four  of  them, 
met  in  some  restaurant,  got  into  an  automobile  with 
Sam  and  the  three  young  men  and  rode  about  town 
laughing,  waving  bottles  of  wine  in  the  air,  and  calling 
to  passers-by  in  the  street.  They  wound  up  in  a  dining- 
room  in  a  place  at  the  edge  of  town,  where  the  party  spent 
hours  around  a  long  table,  drinking,  and  singing  songs. 

One  of  the  girls  sat  on  Sam's  lap  and  put  an  arm 
about  his  neck. 

"Give  me  some  money,  rich  man,"  she  said. 

Sam  looked  at  her  closely. 

"Who  are  you?"  he  asked. 

She  began  explaining  that  she  was  a  clerk  in  a  down 
town  store  and  that  she  had  a  lover  who  drove  a 
laundry  wagon. 

"I  go  on  these  bats  to  get  money  to  buy  good 
clothes,"  she  said  frankly,  "but  if  Tim  saw  me  here  he 
would  kill  me." 

Putting  a  bill  into  her  hand  Sam  went  downstairs  and 
getting  into  a  taxicab  drove  back  to  his  hotel. 

After  that  night  he  went  frequently  on  carouses  of 
this  kind.  He  was  in  a  kind  of  prolonged  stupor  of 
inaction,  talked  of  trips  abroad  which  he  did  not  take, 
bought  a  huge  farm  in  Virginia  which  he  never  visited, 
planned  a  return  to  business  which  he  did  not  execute, 
and  month  after  month  continued  to  waste  his  days.  He 
would  get  out  of  bed  at  noon  and  begin  drinking  steadily. 
As  the  afternoon  passed  he  grew  merry  and  talka 
tive,  calling  men  by  their  first  names,  slapping  chance  ac 
quaintances  on  the  back,  playing  pool  or  billiards  with 
skilful  young  men  intent  upon  gain.  In  the  early  sum 
mer  he  got  in  with  a  party  of  young  men  from  New 
York  and  with  them  spent  months  in  sheer  idle  waste  of 
time.  Together  they  drove  high-powered  automobiles 
on  long  trips,  drank,  quarrelled,  and  went  on  board  a 


328          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

yacht  to  carouse,  alone  or  with  women.  At  times  Sam 
would  leave  his  companions  and  spend  days  riding 
through  the  country  on  fast  trains,  sitting  for  hours  in 
silence  looking  out  of  the  window  at  the  passing  country 
and  wondering  at  his  endurance  of  the  life  he  led.  For 
some  months  he  carried  with  him  a  young  man  whom  he 
called  a  secretary  and  paid  a  large  salary  for  his  ability 
to  tell  stories  and  sing  clever  songs,  only  to  discharge 
him  suddenly  for  telling  a  foul  tale  that  reminded 
Sam  of  another  tale  told  by  the  stoop-shouldered  old 
man  in  the  office  of  Ed's  hotel  in  the  Illinois  town. 

From  being  silent  and  taciturn,  as  during  the  months 
of  his  wanderings,  Sam  became  morose  and  combative. 
Staying  on  and  on  in  the  empty,  aimless  way  of  life  he 
had  adopted  he  yet  felt  that  there  was  for  him  a  right 
way  of  living  and  wondered  at  his  continued  inability 
to  find  it.  He  lost  his  native  energy,  grew  fat  and  coarse 
of  body,  was  pleased  for  hours  by  little  things,  read  no 
books,  lay  for  hours  in  bed  drunk  and  talking  nonsense 
to  himself,  ran  about  the  streets  swearing  vilely,  grew 
habitually  coarse  in  thought  and  speech,  sought  con 
stantly  a  lower  and  more  vulgar  set  of  companions,  was 
brutal  and  ugly  with  attendants  about  hotels  and  clubs 
where  he  lived,  hated  life,  but  ran  like  a  coward  to 
sanitariums  and  health  resorts  at  the  wagging  of  a 
doctor's  head. 


BOOK  IV 


CHAPTER  I 

ONE  afternoon  in  early  September  Sam  got  on  a  west 
ward  bound  train  intending  to  visit  his  sister  on  the 
farm  near  Caxton.  For  years  he  had  heard  nothing 
from  Kate,  but  she  had,  he  knew,  two  daughters  and 
he  thought  he  would  do  something  for  them. 

"I  will  put  them  on  the  Virginia  farm  and  make  a 
will  leaving  them  my  money,"  he  thought.  "Perhaps 
I  shall  be  able  to  make  them  happy  by  setting  them  up 
in  life  and  giving  them  beautiful  clothes  to  wear." 

At  St.  Louis  he  got  off  the  train,  thinking  vaguely 
that  he  would  see  an  attorney  and  make  arrangements 
about  the  will,  and  for  several  days  stayed  about  the 
Planters  Hotel  with  a  set  of  drinking  companions  he 
had  picked  up.  One  afternoon  he  began  going  from 
place  to  place  drinking  and  gathering  companions.  An 
ugly  light  was  in  his  eyes  and  he  looked  at  men  and 
women  passing  in  the  streets,  feeling  that  he  was  in 
the  midst  of  enemies,  and  that  for  him  the  peace,  con 
tentment,  and  good  cheer  that  shone  out  of  the  eyes  of 
others  was  beyond  getting.  In  the  late  afternoon,  fol 
lowed  by  a  troop  of  roistering  companions,  he  came 
out  upon  a  street  flanked  with  small,  brick  warehouses 
facing  the  river,  where  steamboats  lay  tied  to  floating 
docks. 

"I  want  a  boat  to  take  me  and  my  crowd  for  a  cruise 
up  and  down  the  river,"  he  announced,  approaching  the 
captain  of  one  of  the  boats.  "Take  us  up  and  down  the 

329 


330          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

river  until  we  are  tired  of  it.    I  will  pay  what  it  costs." 

It  was  one  of  the  days  when  drink  would  not  take  hold 
of  him,  and  he  went  among  his  companions,  buying 
drinks  and  thinking  himself  a  fool  to  continue  furnish 
ing  entertainment  for  the  vile  crew  that  sat  about  him 
on  the  deck  of  the  boat.  He  began  shouting  and  order 
ing  them  about. 

"Sing  louder,"  he  commanded,  tramping  up  and  down 
and  scowling  at  his  companions. 

A  young  man  of  the  party  who  had  a  reputation  as  a 
dancer  refused  to  perform  when  commanded.  Spring 
ing  forward  Sam  dragged  him  out  on  the  deck  before 
the  shouting  crowd. 

"Now  dance !"  he  growled,  "or  I  will  throw  you  into 
the  river/* 

The  young  man  danced  furiously,  and  Sam  marched 
up  and  down  and  looked  at  him  and  at  the  leering  faces 
of  the  men  and  women  lounging  along  the  deck  or  shout 
ing  at  the  dancer.  The  liquor  in  him  beginning  to  take 
effect,  a  queerly  distorted  version  of  his  old  passion  for 
reproduction  came  to  him  and  he  raised  his  hand  for 
silence. 

"I  want  to  see  a  woman  who  is  a  mother,"  he  shouted. 
"I  want  to  see  a  woman  who  has  borne  children." 

A  small  woman  with  black  hair  and  burning  black 
eyes  sprang  from  the  group  gathered  about  the  dancer. 

"I  have  borne  children — three  of  them,"  she  said, 
laughing  up  into  his  face.  "I  can  bear  more  of  them." 

Sam  looked  at  her  stupidly  and  taking  her  by  the 
arm  led  her  to  a  chair  on  the  deck.  The  crowd  laughed. 

"Belle  is  after  his  roll,"  whispered  a  short,  fat  man 
to  his  companion,  a  tall  woman  with  blue  eyes. 

As  the  steamer,  with  its  load  of  men  and  women 
drinking  and  singing  songs,  went  up  the  river  past 
bluffs  covered  with  trees,  the  woman  beside  Sam  pointed 
to  a  row  of  tiny  houses  at  the  top  of  the  bluffs. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  331 

"My  children  are  there.  They  are  getting  supper 
now,"  she  said. 

She  began  singing,  laughing  and  waving  a  bottle  to 
the  others  sitting  along  the  deck.  A  youth  with  heavy 
features  stood  upon  a  chair  and  sang  a  song  of 
the  street,  and,  jumping  to  her  feet,  Sam's  companion 
kept  time  with  the  bottle  in  her  hand.  Sam  walked 
over  to  where  the  captain  stood  looking  up  the 
river. 

"Turn  back,"  he  said,  "I  am  tired  of  this  crew." 

On  the  way  back  down  the  river  the  black-eyed  woman 
again  sat  beside  Sam. 

"We  will  go  to  my  house,"  she  said  quietly,  "just  you 
and  me.  I  will  show  you  the  kids." 

Darkness  was  gathering  over  the  river  as  the  boat 
turned,  and  in  the  distance  the  lights  of  the  city  began 
blinking  into  view.  The  crowd  had  grown  quiet,  sleep 
ing  in  chairs  along  the  deck  or  gathering  in  small  groups 
and  talking  in  low  tones.  The  black-haired  woman  began 
to  tell  Sam  her  story. 

She  was,  she  said,  the  wife  of  a  plumber  who  had 
left  her. 

"I  drove  him  crazy,"  she  said,  laughing  quietly.  "He 
wanted  me  to  stay  at  home  with  him  and  the  kids  night 
after  night.  He  used  to  follow  me  down  town  at  night 
begging  me  to  come  home.  When  I  wouldn't  come  he 
would  go  away  with  tears  in  his  eyes.  It  made  me 
furious.  He  wasn't  a  man.  He  would  do  anything  I 
asked  him  to  do.  And  then  he  ran  away  and  left  the 
kids  on  my  hands." 

In  the  city  Sam,  with  the  black-haired  woman  beside 
him,  rode  about  in  an  open  carriage,  forgetting  the 
children  and  going  from  place  to  place,  eating  and  drink 
ing.  For  an  hour  they  sat  in  a  box  at  the  theatre,  but 
grew  tired  of  the  performance  and  climbed  again  into 
the  carriage. 


332          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

"We  will  go  to  my  house.  I  want  to  have  you  alone," 
said  the  woman. 

They  drove  through  street  after  street  of  working- 
men's  houses,  where  children  ran  laughing  and  playing 
under  the  lights,  and  two  boys,  their  bare  legs  flashing 
in  the  lights  from  the  lamps  overhead,  ran  after  them, 
holding  to  the  back  of  the  carriage. 

The  driver  whipped  the  horses  and  looked  back  laugh 
ing.  The  woman  got  up  and  kneeling  on  the  seat  of 
the  carriage  laughed  down  into  the  faces  of  the  running 
boys. 

"Run,  you  little  devils/*  she  cried. 

They  held  on,  running  furiously.  Their  legs  twinkled 
and  flashed  under  the  lights. 

"Give  me  a  silver  dollar,"  she  said,  turning  to  Sam, 
and  when  he  had  given  it  to  her,  threw  it  ringing  upon 
the  pavement  under  a  street  lamp.  The  two  boys  darted 
for  it,  shouting  and  waving  their  hands  to  her. 

Swarms  of  huge  flies  and  beetles  circled  under  the 
street  lamps,  striking  Sam  and  the  woman  in  the  face. 
One  of  them,  a  great  black  crawling  thing,  alighted  on 
her  breast,  and  taking  it  in  her  hand  she  crept  forward 
and  dropped  it  down  the  neck  of  the  driver. 

In  spite  of  his  hard  drinking  during  the  afternoon 
and  evening,  Sam's  head  was  clear  and  a  calm  hatred 
of  life  burned  in  him.  His  mind  ran  back  over  the 
years  he  had  passed  since  breaking  his  word  to  Sue, 
and  a  scorn  of  all  effort  burned  in  him. 

"It  is  what  a  man  gets  who  goes  seeking  Truth,"  he 
thought.  "He  comes  to  a  fine  end  in  life." 

On  all  sides  of  him  life  ran  playing  on  the  pavement 
and  leaping  in  the  air.  It  circled  and  buzzed  and  sang 
above  his  head  in  the  summer  night  there  in  the  heart 
of  the  city.  Even  in  the  sullen  man  sitting  in  the  car 
riage  beside  the  black-haired  woman  it  began  to  sing. 
The  blood  climbed  through  his  body;  an  old  half-dead 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  333 

longing,  half  hunger,  half  hope  awoke  in  him,  pulsating 
and  insistent.  He  looked  at  the  laughing,  intoxicated 
woman  beside  him  and  a  feeling  of  masculine  approval 
shot  through  him.  He  began  thinking  of  what  she  had 
said  before  the  laughing  crowd  on  the  steamer. 

"I  have  borne  three  children  and  can  bear  more." 

His  blood,  stirred  by  the  sight  of  the  woman,  awoke 
his  sleeping  brain,  and  he  began  again  to  quarrel  with 
life  and  what  life  had  offered  him.  He  thought  that 
always  he  would  stubbornly  refuse  to  accept  the  call  of 
life  unless  he  could  have  it  on  his  own  terms,  unless 
he  could  command  and  direct  it  as  he  had  commanded 
and  directed  the  gun  company. 

"Else  why  am  I  here?"  he  muttered,  looking  away 
from  the  vacant,  laughing  face  of  the  woman  and  at 
the  broad,  muscular  back  of  the  driver  on  the  seat  in 
front.  "Why  had  I  a  brain  and  a  dream  and  a  hope? 
Why  went  I  about  seeking  Truth?" 

His  mind  ran  on  in  the  vein  started  by  the  sight  of 
the  circling  beetles  and  the  running  boys.  The  woman 
put  her  head  upon  his  shoulder  and  her  black  hair  blew 
against  his  face.  She  struck  wildly  at  the  circling  beetles, 
laughing  like  a  child  when  she  had  caught  one  of  them 
in  her  hand. 

"Men  like  me  are  for  some  end.  They  are  not  to 
be  played  with  as  I  have  been,"  he  muttered,  clinging 
to  the  hand  of  the  woman,  who,  also,  he  thought,  was 
being  tossed  about  by  life. 

Before  a  saloon,  on  a  street  where  cars  ran,  the  car 
riage  stopped.  Through  the  open  front  door  Sam  could 
see  workingmen  standing  before  a  bar  drinking  foam 
ing  glasses  of  beer,  the  hanging  lamps  above  their  heads 
throwing  their  black  shadows  upon  the  floor.  A  strong, 
stale  smell  came  out  at  the  door.  The  woman  leaned 
over  the  side  of  the  carriage  and  shouted,  "O  Will, 
come  out  here." 


334          WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

A  man  clad  in  a  long  white  apron  and  with  his  shirt 
sleeves  rolled  to  his  elbows  came  from  behind  the  bar 
and  talked  to  her,  and  when  they  had  started  on  she 
told  Sam  of  her  plan  to  sell  her  home  and  buy  the 
place. 

"Will  you  run  it?"  he  asked. 

"Sure,"  she  said.  "The  kids  can  take  care  of  them 
selves." 

At  the  end  of  a  little  street  of  a  half  dozen  neat 
cottages,  they  got  out  of  the  carriage  and  walked  with 
uncertain  steps  along  a  sidewalk  skirting  a  high  bluff 
and  overlooking  the  river.  Below  the  houses  a  tangled 
mass  of  bushes  and  small  trees  lay  black  in  the  moon 
light,  and  in  the  distance  the  grey  body  of  the  river 
showed  faint  and  far  away.  The  undergrowth  was  so 
thick  that,  looking  down,  one  saw  only  the  tops  of  the 
growth,  with  here  and  there  a  grey  outcrop  of  rocks 
that  glistened  in  the  moonlight. 

Up  a  flight  of  stone  steps  they  climbed  to  the  porch 
of  one  of  the  houses  facing  the  river.  The  woman  had 
stopped  laughing  and  hung  heavily  on  Sam's  arm,  her 
feet  groping  for  the  steps.  They  passed  through  a  door 
and  into  a  long,  low-ceilinged  room.  An  open  stairway 
at  the  side  of  the  room  went  up  to  the  floor  above,  and 
through  a  curtained  doorway  at  the  end  one  looked  into 
a  small  dining-room.  A  rag  carpet  lay  on  the  floor 
and  about  a  table,  under  a  hanging  lamp  at  the  centre, 
sat  three  children.  Sam  looked  at  them  closely.  His 
head  reeled  and  he  clutched  at  the  knob  of  the  door. 
A  boy  of  perhaps  fourteen,  with  freckles  on  his  face 
and  on  the  backs  of  his  hands  and  with  reddish-brown 
hair  and  brown  eyes,  was  reading  aloud.  Beside  him  a 
younger  boy  with  black  hair  and  black  eyes,  and  with 
his  knees  doubled  up  on  the  chair  in  front  of  him  so  that 
his  chin  rested  on  them,  sat  listening.  A  tiny  girl,  pale 
and  with  yellow  hair  and  dark  circles  under  her  eyes, 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON          335 

slept  in  another  chair,  her  head  hanging  uncomfortably 
to  one  side.  She  was,  one  would  have  said,  seven,  the 
black-haired  boy  ten. 

The  freckle- faced  boy  stopped  reading  and  looked  at 
the  man  and  woman;  the  sleeping  child  stirred  uneasily 
in  her  chair,  and  the  black-haired  boy  straightened  out 
his  legs  and  looked  over  his  shoulder. 

"Hello,  Mother,"  he  said  heartily. 

The  woman  walked  unsteadily  to  the  curtained  door 
way  leading  into  the  dining-room  and  pulled  aside  the 
curtains. 

"Come  here,  Joe,"  she  said. 

The  freckle-faced  boy  arose  and  went  toward  her. 
She  stood  aside,  supporting  herself  with  one  hand  grasp 
ing  the  curtain.  As  he  passed  she  struck  him  with  her 
open  hand  on  the  back  of  the  head,  sending  him  reeling 
into  the  dining-room. 

"Now  you,  Tom/'  she  called  to  the  black-haired  boy. 
"I  told  you  kids  to  wash  the  dishes  after  supper  and 
to  put  Mary  to  bed.  Here  it  is  past  ten  and  nothing 
done  and  you  two  reading  books  again." 

The  black-haired  boy  got  up  and  started  obediently 
toward  her,  but  Sam  walked  rapidly  past  him  and 
clutched  the  woman  by  the  arm  so  that  she  winced  and 
twisted  in  his  grasp. 

"You  come  with  me,"  he  said. 

He  walked  the  woman  across  the  room  and  up  the 
stairs.  She  leaned  heavily  on  his  arm,  laughing,  and 
looking  up  into  his  face. 

At  the  top  of  the  stairway  he  stopped. 

"We  go  in  here,"  she  said,  pointing  to  a  door. 

He  took  her  into  the  room.  "You  get  to  sleep,"  he 
said,  and  going  out  closed  the  door,  leaving  her  sitting 
heavily  on  the  edge  of  the  bed. 

Downstairs  he  found  the  two  boys  among  the  dishes 
in  a  tiny  kitchen  off  the  dining-room.  The  little  girl 


336  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

still  slept  uneasily  in  the  chair  by  the  table,  the  hot 
lamp-light  streaming  down  on  her  thin  cheeks. 

Sam  stood  in  the  kitchen  door  looking  at  the  two 
boys,  who  looked  back  at  him  self-consciously. 

"Which  of  you  two  puts  Mary  to  bed?"  he  asked, 
and  then,  without  waiting  for  an  answer,  turned  to  the 
taller  of  the  two  boys.  "Let  Tom  do  it,"  he  said.  "I 
will  help  you  here." 

Joe  and  Sam  stood  in  the  kitchen  at  work  with  the 
dishes;  the  boy,  going  busily  about,  showed  the  man 
where  to  put  the  clean  dishes,  and  got  him  dry  wiping 
towels.  Sam's  coat  was  off  and  his  sleeves  rolled  up. 

The  work  went  on  in  half  awkward  silence  and  a 
storm  went  on  within  Sam's  breast.  When  the  boy 
Joe  looked  shyly  up  at  him  it  was  as  though  the  lash 
of  a  whip  had  cut  down  across  flesh,  suddenly  grown 
tender.  Old  memories  began  to  stir  within  him  and 
he  remembered  his  own  childhood,  his  mother  at  work 
among  other  people's  soiled  clothes,  his  father  Windy 
coming  home  drunk,  and  the  chill  in  his  mother's 
heart  and  in  his  own.  There  was  something  men  and 
women  owed  to  childhood,  not  because  it  was  child 
hood  but  because  it  was  new  life  springing  up.  Aside 
from  any  question  of  fatherhood  or  motherhood  there 
was  a  debt  to  be  paid. 

In  the  little  house  on  the  bluff  there  was  silence. 
Outside  the  house  there  was  darkness  and  darkness 
lay  over  Sam's  spirit.  The  boy  Joe  went  quickly  about, 
putting  the  dishes  Sam  had  wiped  on  the  shelves. 
Somewhere  on  the  river,  far  below  the  house,  a  steam 
boat  whistled.  The  backs  of  the  hands  of  the  boy 
were  covered  with  freckles.  How  quick  and  competent 
the  hands  were.  Here  was  new  life,  as  yet  clean, 
unsoiled,  unshaken  by  life.  Sam  was  shamed  by  the 
trembling  of  his  own  hands.  He  had  always  wanted 
quickness  and  firmness  within  his  own  body,  the  health 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  337 

of  the  body  that  is  a  temple  for  the  health  of  the 
spirit.  He  was  an  American  and  down  deep  within 
himself  was  the  moral  fervor  that  is  American  and  that 
had  become  so  strangely  perverted  in  himself  and 
others.  As  so  often  happened  with  him,  when  he  was 
deeply  stirred,  an  army  of  vagrant  thoughts  ran 
through  his  head.  The  thoughts  had  taken  the  place 
of  the  perpetual  scheming  and  planning  of  his  days  as 
a  man  of  affairs,  but  as  yet  all  his  thinking  had  brought 
him  to  nothing  and  had  only  left  him  more  shaken 
and  uncertain  than  ever. 

The  dishes  were  now  all  wiped  and  he  went  out  of 
the  kitchen  glad  to  escape  the  shy  silent  presence  of 
the  boy.  "Has  life  quite  gone  from  me?  Am  I  but  a 
dead  thing  walking  about?"  he  asked  himself.  The 
presence  of  the  children  had  made  him  feel  that  he 
was  himself  but  a  child,  a  grown  tired  and  shaken 
child.  There  was  maturity  and  manhood  somewhere 
abroad.  Why  could  he  not  come  to  it?  Why  could 
it  not  come  into  him? 

The  boy  Tom  returned  from  having  put  his  sister 
into  bed  and  the  two  boys  said  good  night  to  the  strange 
man  in  their  mother's  house.  Joe,  the  bolder  of  the 
two,  stepped  forward  and  offered  his  hand.  Sam  shook 
it  solemnly  and  then  the  younger  boy  came  forward. 

"Ill  be  around  here  to-morrow  I  think,"  Sam  said 
huskily. 

The  boys  were  gone,  into  the  silence  of  the  house, 
and  Sam  walked  up  and  down  in  the  little  room.  He 
was  restless  as  though  about  to  start  on  a  new  journey 
and  half  unconsciously  began  running  his  hands  over 
his  body  wishing  it  strong  and  hard  as  when  he  tramped 
the  road.  As  on  the  day  when  he  had  walked  out  of 
the  Chicago  Club  bound  on  his  hunt  for  Truth,  he  let 
his  mind  go  so  that  it  played  freely  over  his  past  life, 
reviewing  and  analysing. 


338  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

For  hours  he  sat  on  the  porch  or  walked  up  and  down 
in  the  room  where  the  lamp  still  burned  brightly. 
Again  the  smoke  from  his  pipe  tasted  good  on  his 
tongue  and  all  the  night  air  had  a  sweetness  that 
brought  back  to  him  the  walk  beside  the  bridle  path  in 
Jackson  Park  when  Sue  had  given  him  herself,  and  with 
herself  a  new  impulse  in  life. 

It  was  two  o'clock  when  he  lay  down  upon  a  couch 
in  the  living-room  and  blew  out  the  light.  He  did  not 
undress,  but  threw  his  shoes  on  the  floor  and  lay 
looking  at  a  wide  path  of  moonlight  that  came  through 
the  open  door.  In  the  darkness  it  seemed  that  his  mind 
worked  more  rapidly  and  that  the  events  and  motives 
of  his  restless  years  went  streaming  past  like  living 
things  upon  the  floor. 

Suddenly  he  sat  up  and  listened.  The  voice  of  one 
of  the  boys,  heavy  with  sleep,  ran  through  the  upper 
part  of  the  house. 

"Mother!  O  Mother!"  called  the  sleepy  voice,  and 
Sam  thought  he  could  hear  the  little  body  moving 
restlessly  in  bed. 

Silence  followed.  He  sat  upon  the  edge  of  the  couch, 
waiting.  It  seemed  to  him  that  he  was  coming  to  some 
thing;  that  his  brain  that  had  for  hours  been  working 
more  and  more  rapidly  was  about  to  produce  the  thing 
for  which  he  waited.  He  felt  as  he  had  felt  that  night 
as  he  waited  in  the  corridor  of  the  hospital. 

In  the  morning  the  three  children  came  down  the 
stairs  and  finished  dressing  in  the  long  room,  the  little 
girl  coming  last,  carrying  her  shoes  and  stockings  and 
rubbing  her  eyes  with  the  back  of  her  hand.  A  cool 
morning  wind  blew  up  from  the  river  and  through 
the  open  screened  doors  as  he  and  Joe  cooked  break 
fast,  and  later  as  the  four  of  them  sat  at  the  table 
Sam  tried  to  talk  but  did  not  make  much  progress. 
His  tongue  was  heavy  and  the  children  seemed  looking 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  339 

at  him  with  strange  questioning  eyes.  "Why  are  you 
here?"  their  eyes  asked. 

For  a  week  Sam  stayed  in  the  city,  coming  daily  to 
the  house.  With  the  children  he  talked  a  little,  and  in 
the  evening,  when  the  mother  had  gone  away,  the  little 
girl  came  to  him.  He  carried  her  to  a  chair  on  the 
porch  outside  and  while  the  boys  sat  reading  under 
the  lamp  inside  she  went  to  sleep  in  his  arms.  Her  body 
was  warm  and  the  breath  came  softly  and  sweetly 
from  between  her  lips.  Sam  looked  down  the  bluffside 
and  saw  the  country  and  the  river  far  below,  sweet  in 
the  moonlight.  Tears  came  into  his  eyes.  Was  a  new 
sweet  purpose  growing  within  him  or  were  the  tears 
but  evidence  of  self  pity.  He  wondered. 

One  night  the  black-haired  woman  again  came  home 
far  gone  in  drink,  and  again  Sam  led  her  up  the  stairs 
to  see  her  fall  muttering  and  babbling  upon  the  bed. 
Her  companion,  a  little  flashily  dressed  man  with  a 
beard,  had  run  off  at  the  sight  of  Sam  standing  in  the 
living-room  under  the  lamp.  The  two  boys,  to  whom 
he  had  been  reading,  said  nothing,  looking  self-con 
sciously  at  the  book  upon  the  table  and  occasionally 
out  of  the  corner  of  their  eyes  at  their  new  friend.  In  a 
few  minutes  they  too  went  up  the  stairs,  and  as  on  that 
first  night,  they  put  out  their  hands  awkwardly. 

Through  the  night  Sam  again  sat  in  the  darkness  out 
side  or  lay  awake  on  the  couch.  "I  will  make  a  new 
try,  adopt  a  new  purpose  in  life  now,"  he  said  to 
himself. 

When  the  children  had  gone  to  school  the  next  morn 
ing,  Sam  took  a  car  and  went  into  the  city,  going  first 
to  a  bank  to  have  a  large  draft  cashed.  Then  he  spent 
many  busy  hours  going  from  store  to  store  and  buying 
clothes,  caps,  soft  underwear,  suit  cases,  dresses,  night 
clothes  and  books.  Last  of  all  he  bought  a  large  dressed 
doll.  All  these  things  he  had  sent  to  his  room  at  the 


340  WINDY  McPHERSON'S   SON 

hotel,  leaving  a  man  there  to  pack  the  trunks  and  suit 
cases,  and  get  them  to  the  station.  A  large,  motherly- 
looking  woman,  an  employe  of  the  hotel,  who  passed 
through  the  hall,  offered  to  help  with  the  packing. 

After  another  visit  or  two  Sam  got  back  upon  the 
car  and  went  again  to  the  house.  In  his  pockets  he 
had  several  thousands  of  dollars  in  large  bills.  He  had 
remembered  the  power  of  cash  in  deals  he  had  made  in 
the  past. 

"I  will  see  what  it  will  do  here,"  he  thought. 

In  the  house  Sam  found  the  black-haired  woman 
lying  on  a  couch  in  the  living-room.  As  he  came  in 
at  the  door  she  arose  unsteadily  and  looked  at  him. 

"There's  a  bottle  in  the  cupboard  in  the  kitchen," 
she  said.  "Get  me  a  drink.  Why  do  you  hang  about 
here?" 

Sam  brought  the  bottle  and  poured  her  a  drink,  pre 
tending  to  drink  with  her  by  putting  the  bottle  to  his 
lips  and  throwing  back  his  head. 

"What  was  your  husband  like?"  he  asked. 

"Who?  Jack?"  she  said.  "Oh,  he  was  all  right. 
He  was  stuck  on  me.  He  stood  for  anything  until  I 
brought  men  home  here.  Then  he  got  crazy  and  went 
away."  She  looked  at  Sam  and  laughed. 

"I  didn't  care  much  for  him,"  she  added.  "He 
couldn't  make  money  enough  for  a  live  woman." 

Sam  began  talking  of  the  saloon  she  intended  buying. 

"The  children  will  be  a  bother,  eh?"  he  said. 

"I  have  an  offer  for  the  house,"  she  said.  "I  wish 
I  didn't  have  the  kids.  They  are  a  nuisance." 

"I  have  been  figuring  that  out,"  Sam  told  her.  "I 
know  a  woman  in  the  east  who  would  take  them  and 
raise  them.  She  is  wild  about  kids.  I  should  like  to 
do  something  to  help  you.  I  might  take  them  to  her." 

"In  the  name  of  Heaven,  man,  lead  them  away,"  she 
laughed,  and  took  another  drink  from  the  bottle. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  341 

Sam  drew  from  his  pocket  a  paper  he  had  secured 
from  a  downtown  attorney. 

"Get  a  neighbour  in  here  to  witness  this,"  he  said. 
' '  The  woman  will  want  things  regular.  It  releases  you 
from  all  responsibility  for  the  kids  and  puts  it  on  her." 

She  looked  at  him  suspiciously.  "What's  the  graft? 
Who  gets  stuck  for  the  fares  down  east?" 

Sam  laughed  and  going  to  the  back  door  shouted  to 
a  man  who  sat  under  a  tree  back  of  the  next  house 
smoking  a  pipe. 

"Sign  here,"  he  said,  putting  the  paper  before  her. 
"Here  is  your  neighbour  to  sign  as  witness.  You  do 
not  get  stuck  for  a  cent." 

The  woman,  half  drunk,  signed  the  paper,  after  a 
long  doubtful  look  at  Sam,  and  when  she  had  signed 
and  had  taken  another  drink  from  the  bottle  lay  down 
again  on  the  couch. 

"If  any  one  wakes  me  up  for  the  next  six  hours 
they  will  get  killed,"  she  declared.  It  was  evident  she 
knew  little  of  what  she  had  done,  but  at  the  moment 
Sam  did  not  care.  He  was  again  a  bargainer,  ready  to 
take  an  advantage.  Vaguely  he  felt  that  he  might 
be  bargaining  for  an  end  in  life,  for  purpose  to  come 
into  his  own  life. 

Sam  went  quietly  down  the  stone  steps  and  along  the 
little  street  at  the  brow  of  the  hill  to  the  car  tracks, 
and  at  noon  was  waiting  in  an  automobile  outside 
the  door  of  the  schoolhouse  when  the  children  came 
out. 

He  drove  across  the  city  to  the  Union  Station,  the 
three  children  accepting  him  and  all  he  did  without 
question.  At  the  station  they  found  the  man  from  the 
hotel  with  the  trunks  and  with  three  bright  new  suit 
cases.  Sam  went  to  the  express  office  and  putting 
several  bills  into  an  envelope  sealed  and  sent  it  to  the 
woman  while  the  three  children  walked  up  and  down 


342  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

in  the  train  shed  carrying  the  cases,  aglow  with  the 
pride  of  them. 

At  two  o'clock  Sam,  with  the  little  girl  in  his  arms 
and  with  one  of  the  boys  seated  on  either  side  of  him, 
sat  in  a  stateroom  of  a  New  York  flyer — bound  for 
Sue. 


CHAPTER  II 

SAM  McPHERSON  is  a  living  American.  He  is  a  rich 
man,  but  his  money,  that  he  spent  so  many  years  and 
so  much  of  his  energy  acquiring,  does  not  mean  much 
to  him.  What  is  true  of  him  is  true  of  more  wealthy 
Americans  than  is  commonly  believed.  Something  has 
happened  to  him  that  has  happened  to  the  others 
also,  to  how  many  of  the  others  ?  Men  of  courage,  with 
strong  bodies  and  quick  brains,  men  who  have  come  of 
a  strong  race,  have  taken  up  what  they  had  thought 
to  be  the  banner  of  life  and  carried  it  forward.  Grow 
ing  weary  they  have  stopped  in  a  road  that  climbs  a 
long  hill  and  have  leaned  the  banner  against  a  tree. 
Tight  brains  have  loosened  a  little.  Strong  convictions 
have  become  weak.  Old  gods  are  dying. 

"It  is  only  when  you  are  torn  from  your  mooring  and 
drift  like  a  rudderless  ship  I  am  able  to  come 
near  to  you." 

The  banner  has  been  carried  forward  by  a  strong 
daring  man  filled  with  determination. 

What  is  inscribed  on  it? 

It  would  perhaps  be  dangerous  to  inquire  too  closely. 
We  Americans  have  believed  that  life  must  have  point 
and  purpose.  We  have  called  ourselves  Christians 
but  the  sweet  Christian  philosophy  of  failure  has  been 
unknown  among  us.  To  say  of  one  of  us  that  he  has 
failed  is  to  take  life  and  courage  away.  For  so  long 
we  have  had  to  push  blindly  forward.  Roads  had 
to  be  cut  through  our  forests,  great  towns  must  be 

343 


344  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

built.  What  in  Europe  has  been  slowly  building  itself 
out  of  the  fibre  of  the  generations  we  must  build  now, 
in  a  lifetime. 

In  our  father's  day,  at  night  in  the  forests  of 
Michigan,  Ohio,  Kentucky  and  on  the  wide  prairies, 
wolves  howled.  There  was  fear  in  our  fathers  and 
mothers,  pushing  their  way  forward,  making  the  new 
land.  When  the  land  was  conquered  fear  remained, 
the  fear  of  failure.  Deep  in  our  American  souls  the 
wolves  still  howl. 

There  were  moments  after  Sam  came  back  to  Sue, 
bringing  the  three  children,  when  he  thought  he  had 
snatched  success  out  of  the  very  jaws  of  failure. 

But  the  thing  from  which  he  had  all  his  life  been 
fleeing  was  still  there.  It  hid  itself  in  the  branches 
of  the  trees  that  lined  the  New  England  roads  where 
he  went  to  walk  with  the  two  boys.  At  night  it  looked 
down  at  him  from  the  stars. 

Perhaps  life  wanted  acceptance  from  him  but  he 
could  not  accept.  Perhaps  his  story  and  his  life  ended 
with  the  home-coming,  perhaps  it  began  then. 

The  home-coming  was  not  in  itself  a  completely 
happy  event.  There  was  a  house  with  a  fire  at  night 
and  the  voices  of  the  children.  In  Sam's  breast  there 
was  a  feeling  of  something  alive,  growing. 

Sue  was  generous  but  she  was  not  now  the  Sue  of 
the  bridle  path  in  Jackson  Park  in  Chicago  or  the  Sue 
who  had  tried  to  remake  the  world  by  raising  fallen 
women.  On  his  arrival  at  her  house,  on  a  summer 
night,  coming  in  suddenly  and  strangely  with  the 
three  strange  children — a  little  inclined  toward  tears 
and  homesickness — she  was  flustered  and  nervous. 

Darkness  was  coming  on  when  he  walked  up  the 
gravel  path  from  the  gate  to  the  house  door  with  the 
child  Mary  in  his  arms  and  the  two  boys,  Joe  and 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  345 

Tom,  walking  soberly  and  solemnly  beside  him. 
Sue  had  just  come  out  at  the  front  door  and  stood 
regarding  them,  startled  and  a  little  frightened. 
Her  hair  was  becoming  grey,  but  as  she  stood  there 
Sam  thought  her  figure  almost  boyish  in  its  slender- 
ness. 

With  quick  generosity  she  threw  aside  the  inclina 
tion  in  herself  to  ask  many  questions  but  there  was 
the  suggestion  of  a  taunt  in  the  question  she  did 
ask. 

"Have  you  decided  to  come  back  to  me  and  is  this 
your  home-coming?"  she  asked,  stepping  down  into 
the  path  and  looking,  not  at  Sam  but  at  the  children. 

Sam  did  not  answer  at  once  and  little  Mary  began 
to  cry.  That  was  a  help. 

"They  will  all  be  wanting  something  to  eat  and  a 
place  to  sleep,"  he  said,  as  though  coming  back  to  a 
wife,  long  neglected,  and  bringing  with  him  three 
strange  children  were  an  everyday  affair. 

Although  she  was  puzzled  and  afraid,  Sue  smiled 
and  led  the  way  into  the  house.  Lamps  were  lighted 
and  the  five  human  beings,  so  abruptly  brought  to 
gether,  stood  looking  at  each  other.  The  two  boys 
clung  to  each  other  and  little  Mary  put  her  arms  about 
Sam's  neck  and  hid  her  face  on  his  shoulder.  He  un 
loosed  her  clutching  hands  and  put  her  boldly  into 
Sue's  arms.  "She  will  be  your  mother  now,"  he  said 
defiantly,  not  looking  at  Sue. 

The  evening  was  got  through,  blunderingly  by  him 
self,  Sam  thought,  and  very  nobly  by  Sue. 

There  was  the  mother  hunger  still  alive  in  her.  He 
had  shrewdly  counted  on  that.  It  blinded  her  eyes 
to  other  things  and  then  a  notion  had  come  into  her 
head  and  there  seemed  the  possibility  of  doing  a 
peculiarly  romantic  act.  Before  that  notion  was 


346  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

destroyed,  later  in  the  evening,  both  Sam  and  the 
children  had  been  installed  in  the  house. 

A  tall  strong  negress  came  into  the  room  and  Sue 
gave  her  instructions  regarding  food  for  the  children. 
"They  will  want  bread  and  milk  and  beds  must  be 
found  for  them,"  she  said,  and  then,  although  her 
mind  was  still  filled  with  the  romantic  notion  that 
they  were  Sam's  children  by  some  other  woman,  she 
took  her  plunge.  "This  is  Mr.  McPherson,  my  hus 
band,  and  these  are  our  three  children,"  she  announced 
to  the  puzzled  and  smiling  servant. 

They  went  into  a  low-ceilinged  room  whose  windows 
looked  into  a  garden.  In  the  garden  an  old  negro 
with  a  sprinkling  can  was  watering  flowers.  A  little 
light  yet  remained.  Both  Sam  and  Sue  were  glad  there 
was  no  more.  "Don't  bring  lamps,  a  candle  will  do," 
Sue  said,  and  she  went  to  stand  near  the  door  beside 
her  husband.  The  three  children  were  on  the  point 
of  breaking  forth  into  sobs,  but  the  negro  woman  with 
a  quick  intuitive  sense  of  the  situation  began  to  chatter, 
striving  to  make  the  children  feel  at  home.  She  awoke 
wonder  and  hope  in  the  breasts  of  the  boys.  "There  is 
a  barn  with  horses  and  cows.  To-morrow  old  Ben  will 
show  you  everything,"  she  said  smiling  at  them. 

A  thick  grove  of  elm  and  maple  trees  stood  between 
Sue's  house  and  a  road  that  went  down  a  hill  into  a 
New  England  village,  and  while  Sue  and  the  negro 
woman  put  the  children  to  bed,  Sam  went  there  to 
wait.  In  the  feeble  light  the  trunks  of  trees  could  be 
dimly  seen,  but  the  thick  branches  overhead  made  a 
wall  between  him  and  the  sky.  He  went  back  into  the 
darkness  of  the  grove  and  then  returned  toward  the 
open  space  before  the  house. 

He  was  nervous  and  distraught  and  two  Sam  Mc- 
Phersons  seemed  struggling  for  possession  of  his  person. 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  347 

There  was  the  man  he  had  been  taught  by  the  life 
about  him  to  bring  always  to  the  surface,  the  shrewd 
capable  man  who  got  his  own  way,  trampled  people 
underfoot,  went  plunging  forward,  always  he  hoped 
forward,  the  man  of  achievement. 

And  then  there  was  another  personality,  a  quite 
different  being  altogether,  buried  away  within  him, 
long  neglected,  often  forgotten,  a  timid,  shy,  destructive 
Sam  who  had  never  really  breathed  or  lived  or  walked 
before  men. 

What  of  him?  The  life  Sam  had  led  had  not  taken 
the  shy  destructive  thing  within  into  account.  Still 
it  was  powerful.  Had  it  not  torn  him  out  of  his  place 
in  life,  made  of  him  a  homeless  wanderer?  How  many 
times  it  had  tried  to  speak  its  own  word,  take  entire 
possession  of  him. 

It  was  trying  again  now,  and  again  and  from  old 
habit  Sam  fought  against  it,  thrusting  it  back  into  the 
dark  inner  caves  of  himself,  back  into  darkness. 

He  kept  whispering  to  himself.  Perhaps  now  the 
test  of  his  life  had  come.  There  was  a  way  to  approach 
life  and  love.  There  was  Sue.  A  basis  for  love  and 
understanding  might  be  found  with  her.  Later  the 
impulse  could  be  carried  on  and  into  the  lives  of  the 
children  he  had  found  and  brought  to  her. 

A  vision  of  himself  as  a  truly  humble  man,  kneeling 
before  life,  kneeling  before  the  intricate  wonder  of 
life,  came  to  him,  but  he  was  again  afraid.  When  he 
saw  Sue's  figure,  dressed  in  white,  a  dim,  pale,  flashing 
thing,  coming  down  steps  toward  him,  he  wanted  to 
run  away,  to  hide  himself  in  the  darkness. 

And  he  wanted  also  to  run  toward  her,  to  kneel  at 
her  feet,  not  because  she  was  Sue  but  because  she 
was  human  and  like  himself  filled  with  human  per 
plexities. 

He  did  neither  of  the  two  things.    The  boy  of  Cax- 


348  WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON 

ton  was  still  alive  within  him.  With  a  boyish  lift  of 
the  head  he  went  boldly  to  her.  "Nothing  but  boldness 
will  answer  now,"  he  kept  saying  to  himself. 

They  walked  in  the  gravel  path  before  the  house  and 
he  tried  lamely  to  tell  his  story,  the  story  of  his  wander 
ings,  of  his  seeking.  When  he  came  to  the  tale  of  the 
finding  of  the  children  she  stopped  in  the  path  and 
stood  listening,  pale  and  tense  in  the  half  light. 

Then  she  threw  back  her  head  and  laughed,  ner 
vously,  half  hysterically.  "I  have  taken  them  and  you, 
of  course,"  she  said,  after  he  had  stepped  to  her  and 
had  put  his  arm  about  her  waist.  "My  life  alone 
hasn't  turned  out  to  be  a  very  inspiring  affair.  I  had 
made  up  my  mind  to  take  them  and  you,  in  the  house 
there.  The  two  years  you  have  been  gone  have  seemed 
like  an  age.  What  a  foolish  mistake  my  mind  has 
made.  I  thought  they  must  be  your  own  children  by 
some  other  woman,  some  woman  you  had  found  to 
take  my  place.  It  was  an  odd  notion.  Why,  the  older 
of  the  two  must  be  nearly  fourteen." 

They  went  toward  the  house,  the  negro  woman 
having,  at  Sue's  command,  found  food  for  Sam  and 
respread  the  table,  but  at  the  door  he  stopped  and 
excusing  himself  stepped  again  into  the  darkness 
under  the  trees. 

In  the  house  lamps  had  been  lighted  and  he  could 
see  Sue's  figure  going  through  a  room  at  the  front  of 
the  house  toward  the  dining-room.  Presently  she  re 
turned  and  pulled  the  shades  at  the  front  windows. 
A  place  was  being  prepared  for  him  inside  there,  a 
shut-in  place  in  which  he  was  to  live  what  was  left  of 
Jiis  life. 

With  the  pulling  of  the  shades  darkness  dropped 
down  over  the  figure  of  the  man  standing  just  within 
the  grove  of  trees  and  darkness  dropped  down  over  the 


WINDY  McPHERSON'S  SON  349 

inner  man  also.    The  struggle  within  him  became  more 
intense. 

Could  he  surrender  to  others,  live  for  others?  There 
was  the  house  darkly  seen  before  him.  It  was  a  sym 
bol.  Within  the  house  was  the  woman,  Sue,  ready 
and  willing  to  begin  the  task  of  rebuilding  their  lives 
together.  Upstairs  in  the  house  now  were  the  three 
children,  three  children  who  must  begin  life  as  he  had 
once  done,  who  must  listen  to  his  voice,  the  voice  of 
Sue  and  all  the  other  voices  they  would  hear  speaking 
words  in  the  world.  They  would  grow  up  and  thrust 
out  into  a  world  of  people  as  he  had  done. 

To  what  end? 

There  was  an  end.  Sam  believed  that  stoutly.  "To 
shift  the  load  to  the  shoulders  of  children  is  cowardice," 
he  whispered  to  himself. 

An  almost  overpowering  desire  to  turn  and  run  away 
from  the  house,  from  Sue  who  had  so  generously  re 
ceived  him  and  from  the  three  new  lives  into  which  he 
had  thrust  himself  and  in  which  in  the  future  he  would 
have  to  be  concerned  took  hold  of  him.  His  body 
shook  with  the  strength  of  it,  but  he  stood  still  under 
the  trees.  "I  cannot  run  away  from  life.  I  must  face 
it.  I  must  begin  to  try  to  understand  these  other  lives, 
to  love,"  he  told  himself.  The  buried  inner  thing  in 
him  thrust  itself  up. 

How  still  the  night  had  become.  In  the  tree  beneath 
which  he  stood  a  bird  moved  on  some  slender  branch  and 
there  was  a  faint  rustling  of  leaves.  The  darkness  before 
and  behind  was  a  wall  through  which  he  must  in  some 
way  manage  to  thrust  himself  into  the  light.  With  his 
hand  before  him,  as  though  trying  to  push  aside  some 
dark  blinding  mass,  he  moved  out  of  the  grove  and  thus 
moving  stumbled  up  the  steps  and  into  the  house. 

THE    END 


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